u ':teld  Library 

The  Religion  of  Science  Library 


Number  30 

Bi-Monthly 


MARCH,  1898 

Entered  at  the  Chicago  Post  Office  as  Second  Class  Mail  Matter. 


Price,  25c 
Yearly,  $1.50 


Chinese  Philosophy 


BY 


DR.  PAUL  CARUS 


B\£6 
.C3, 2 


CHICAGO 

THE  OPEN  COURT  PUBLISHING  COMPANY 

(LONDON  : Kegan  Paul,  Trench,  Truebner  & Co.) 

1898 


sofW;': 


, d~53~ 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY 


AN 

EXPOSITION  OF  THE  MAIN  CHARACTERISTIC 
FEATURES  OF  CHINESE  THOUGHT 


DR.  PAUL  YARUS 


CHICAGO 

THE  OPEN  COURT  PUBLISHING  COMPANY 
LONDON  : Kegan  Paul,  Trench,  Triibner  & Co. 

1898 


In  reply  to  a copy  of  this  article  forwarded  through  the  American  representa- 
tive to  H.  M.  the  Emperor  of  China,  the  Tsungli  Yamen,  which  is  the  Imperial 
Foreign  Office,  returned  the  following  informal  communication  : 

THE  TSUNGLI  YAMEN  TO  THE  HON.  MR.  DENBY. 

Informal.  Pekin,  May  6th,  1896. 

Your  Excellency: 

We  have  had  the  honor  to  receive  Your  Excellency's  note,  wherein  you  state 
that  by  particular  request  you  send  the  Yamen  a copy  of  the  Monist — an  American 
Magazine.  Your  Excellency  further  states  that  it  contains  an  article  on  "Chinese 
Philosophy  ” and  the  author  asks  that  it  be  delivered  to  H.  M.  the  Emperor. 

In  reply  we  beg  to  state,  that  the  article  in  question  has  been  translated  into 
Chinese  by  order  of  the  Yamen  and  has  been  duly  perused  by  the  members  thereof. 

The  article  shows  that  the  writer  is  a scholar  well  versed  in  Chinese  literature, 
and  has  brought  together  matters  which  indicate  that  he  fully  understood  the  sub- 
ject he  has  treated. 

The  book  will  be  placed  on  file  in  the  archives  of  the  Yamen. 


Copyright  by 

The  Open  Court  Publishing  Co. 
1896 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY.1 


INTRODUCTORY. 


HINESE  philosophy  is  as  peculiar  as  the  Chinese  language  and 


Chinese  customs,  and  it  is  difficult  for  Western  people  to  un- 
derstand its  nature  or  to  appreciate  its  paramount  influence  upon 
the  national  character  of  the  Celestial  Empire.  It  is  a rare  mixture 
of  deep  thought  and  vain  speculations,  of  valuable  ideas  and  useless 
subtleties.  It  shows  us  a noble  beginning  and  a lame  progress  ; a 
grand  start  and  a dreary  stagnation  ; a promising  seed-time  and  a 
poor  harvest.  The  heroes  of  thought  who  laid  its  foundations, 
were  so  much  admired  that  none  dared  to  excel  them,  and  thus  be- 
fore the  grandeur  of  the  original  genius  which  looms  up  in  the  pre- 
historic age,  the  philosophy  of  all  later  generations  is  dwarfed  into 
timid  insignificance. 

The  Chinese  are  naturally  conservative  because  their  written 
language  is  rigid  and  inflexible,  rendering  the  task  of  forming  new 
words  extremely  difficult.  And  the  people  who  are  hampered  in 
forming  new  words  are  also  hampered  in  their  conception  of  new 
ideas  and  the  discovery  of  new  truths.  But  let  us  remember  that  this 
drawback  of  the  Chinese  script  is  only  an  incidental  consequence  of 
its  extraordinary  advantages.  Consider  that  whatever  changes  there 
may  have  been  in  Chinese  speech,  i.  e.,  in  oral  language,  the  Chi- 
nese scholars  of  to-day  can  read  without  great  difficulty  the  books 
that  were  written  two  and  one-half  millenniums  ago.  Moreover,  their 
ideographic  script  is  more  impressive  and  direct  than  our  phonetic 


:The  Chinese  characters  that  appear  in  this  article  were  made  by  Mr.  H.  H. 
Clarke  of  the  Stationers’  Engraving  Company,  Chicago,  111. 


2 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


method  of  writing  in  which  the  letters  must  be  translated  into  sound 
before  they  can  be  understood  by  the  reader.  Dr.  Morrison  says 
in  the  introductory  remarks  to  his  dictionary  (p.  n)  : 

"As  sight  is  quicker  than  hearing,  so  ideas  reaching  the  mind  by  the  eye  are 
quicker,  more  striking,  and  vivid,  than  those  which  reach  the  mind  b)7  the  slower 
progress  of  sound.  The  character  forms  a picture  which  really  is,  or,  by  early  as- 
sociations is  considered,  beautiful  and  impressive.  The  Chinese  fine  writing  darts 
upon  the  mind  with  a vivid  flash  ; a force  and  a beauty,  of  which  alphabetic  lan- 
guage is  incapable." 

But  it  is  not  the  rigidity  of  their  language  alone  that  is  at  the 
basis  of  the  Chinese  conservatism,  it  is  also  the  simplicity  of  the 
fundamental  ideas  of  their  world-view  and  the  striking  symbolism  in 
which  they  are  expressed  and  which  makes  it  impossible  for  the  Chi- 
nese to  think  in  any  other  modes  of  thought  than  their  own.  The 
inviolable  power  of  their  tradition  is  further  strengthened  by  an  im- 
perturbable patience  and  unbounded  reverence  for  the  sages  of  yore. 
The  former  renders  the  people  submissive  to  many  unheard-of  abuses 
on  the  part  of  the  authorities,  while  the  latter  keeps  them  in  faithful 
adhesion  to  established  conditions. 

From  time  immemorial  the  highest  ideal  of  Chinese  thinkers 
has  been  to  bow  in  modesty  and  submission  to  the  insuperable  gran- 
deur of  their  ancient  traditions.  Criticism  is  very  meek,  originality 
of  thought  is  strangled  ere  it  can  develop,  and  any  attempted  pro- 
gress beyond  the  old  masters  appears  to  them  as  insanity.  It  is  as 
if  a Christian  would  dare  to  be  better  or  wiser  than  Christ.  In  a 
word,  the  whole  Chinese  civilisation  is  saturated  with  the  belief  in 
the  divinity,  the  perfection,  and  the  unqualified  excellence  of  its 
principles,  doctrines,  and  institutions. 

In  the  following  pages  we  shall  attempt  to  delineate  in  large 
outlines  the  philosophy  that  underlies  the  Chinese  civilisation,  and 
we  hope  that  it  will  not  only  enable  the  reader  to  comprehend  how 
the  Chinese  are  hampered  by  their  mode  of  notation  in  both  their 
thought-symbols  and  their  language,  but  that  he  will  also  learn  to 
appreciate  the  causes  which  produce  Chinese  conservatism.  For, 
indeed,  there  is  in  the  Chinese  world-conception  so  much  that  ap- 
peals to  us  as  self-evident  and  on  a priori  consideration  as  a matter 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


3 


of  course,  that  we  can  understand  how  difficult  it  is  for  the  Chinese 
to  free  themselves  from  the  rigid  forms  of  their  traditions  and  adapt 
themselves  to  the  more  plastic  modes  of  Western  thought. 


THE  YANG  AND  THE  YIN 

The  ancient  Chinese  were  distinguished  by  a mathematical  turn 
of  mind.  For,  while  the  literature  of  all  other  nations  begins  with 
religious  hymns  and  mythological  lore  of  some  kind,  the  oldest  docu- 
ments of  the  Chinese  exhibit  arithmetical  devices,  two  among  which 
are  known  as  the  yjaj"  |^|  Ho  T'u1  and  the  Loll  shu,  “the 

map  of  the  Ho,2 or  [yellow]  River”  and  “the  writing  of  the  (river) 
Loh.” 

All  Chinese  scholars  who  have  attempted  to  reconstruct  the 
map  of  the  Ho  and  the  writing  of  the  Loh  agree  in  adopting  a dual- 
istic  system,  which  conceives  the  world  as  the  product  of 


YANG  and  YIN.3  Yang  means  “bright,”  and  Yin  “dark.” 
Yang  is  the  principle  of  heaven,  Yin  is  the  principle  of  earth.  Yang 
is  the  sun,  Yin  is  the  moon.  Yang  is,  as  we  should  say,  positive;  Yin 
is  negative.  Yang  is,  as  the  Chinese  say,  masculine  and  active; 
Yin  is  feminine  and  passive.  The  former  is  motion,  the  latter  is 
rest.  Yang  is  strong,  rigid,  lordlike;  Yin  is  mild,  pliable,  submis- 
sive, wifelike.  Yang  was  originally  represented  by  a small,  bright 
circle  (o),  Yin  by  a small,  dark  circle  (•),  but  in  their  combina- 
tions these  symbols  were  replaced  by  full  and  broken  lines,  ” 

and  “ — . ” 

The  symbols  of  Yang  and  Yin  are  called  the  two  I or  “ele- 
mentary forms,”  and  the  four  combinations  of  the  two  I in  twos  are 
called  the  four  Figures  or  Siang.4  They  are  as  follows  :5 


1 The  spiritus  asper  in  T'u  indicates  that  the  T must  be  pronounced  with  a cer- 
tain vigor  or  emphasis.  French  and  German  sinologists  spell  "Thu,"  which  tran- 
scription, however,  is  misleading  in  English. 

2 Ho , the  River,  stands  for  Hoang  Ho,  the  yellow  river. 


shows  the  symbols  "place"  and  "spreading”; 
side  of  a hill.” 

4 See  Mayer’s  Chinese  Reader's  Manual , pp.  293  and  309. 

6 Yih  King,  App.  V.,  Chap.  VII. 


is  "the  shady 


4 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


the  great  Yang  the  small  Yin  the  small  Yang  the  great  Yin 

Groups  of  three  or  more  elementary  forms  are  called  Kwax  ^Jv 
The  eight  possible  trigrams,  or  permutations  of  three  I,  possess 
their  own  names  and  meanings,  which  (according  to  Legge)  are  as 
follows  : 


KWA 

NAMES 

STANDING  FOR 

REPRE- 
SENTED BY 
THE 

1 ^zzzz 

ch'ien. 

Heaven  or  sky. 

Strength. 

Horse. 

2 

tui. 

Lake  (water  collected  in 

Pleasure  or  satisfac- 

Goat. 

a basin). 

tion. 

3 

li. 

Fire  (the  sun  or  light- 

Brightness. 

Pheasant. 

nmg). 

4 

chan. 

Thunder. 

Energy  or  mobility. 

Dragon. 

5 1 

siuen. 

Wind. 

Penetration. 

Bird. 

6 

kan. 

Moon,  streams  of  water 

Sinking  down,  danger. 

Pig. 

in  motion,  clouds,  rain. 

7 — — 

kan. 

Mountain. 

Arrest,  standstill. 

Dog. 

8 ■■ 

kw'un. 

Earth. 

Compliance  or  docility. 

Ox. 

All  the  things  in  the  world,  man  included,  are  thought  to  be 
compounds  of  Yang  and  Yin  elements.  In  this  way  the  Chinese 
philosophy  has  become  a theory  of  permutation,  and  the  origin  of 
all  things  is  traced  to  a change  in  the  combinations  of  Yang  and  Yin. 


FUH-HI 


AND  YU 


As  to  the  map  of  the  Ho  and  the  writing  of  the  Loh,  we  must 
state  at  once  that  nothing  definite  is  known  concerning  their  original 
form  and  significance.  Only  this  much  is  safe  to  say,  that  tradition 
unanimously  connects  the  former  with  ^ Fuh-hi,  the  first 

emperor  of  China  and  the  legendary  founder  of  the  Chinese  civilisa- 


1 The  character 
divine.  ” 


shows  on  the  left-hand  side  “batton,”  on  the  right  "to 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


5 


tion  (about  3322  B.  C.,  according  to  another  calculation  about  2800 
B.  C.),  and  the  latter  with  ^ Yii  the  Great  (about  2200  B.  C.), 
the  founder  of  the  second  Chinese  dynasty. 

We  are  told  of  a great  deluge  that  devastated  the  county  un- 
der the  virtuous  Yao,  the  last  emperor  but  one  of  the  first  dynasty; 
and  that  Kwen,  the  Minister  of  Works,  labored  in  vain  to  control  the 
waters.  Kwen  was  banished  for  life  to  Mount  Yii  in  2286  B.  C., 
while  his  duties  were  intrusted  to  his  son,  Yii,  who  at  last,  after  nine 
years,  in  2278  B.  C. , succeeded  in  draining  the  floods.  Emperor 
Shun,  the  son-in-law  and  successor  of  Emperor  Yao,  in  disregard  of 
his  own  sons,  raised  Yii  to  the  position  of  joint  regent  in  2224  B.  C., 
and  bequeathed  to  him  the  empire.  When  Shun,  in  2208  B.  C., 
died,  Yii  observed  a three  years’  period  of  mourning,  whereupon  he 
assumed  the  government,  in  2205  B.  C. 

Much  may  be  legendary  in  the  records  of  the  ancient  history  of 
the  Chinese,  but  there  is  no  doubt  that  Yao,  Shun,  and  Yii  are  his- 
torical personages.  They  represent  an  epoch  of  civilisation  which, 
probably  in  more  than  one  respect,  has  never  been  reached  again  by 
the  Chinese.  Public  works,  such  as  regulating  the  course  of  great 
rivers,  were  undertaken,  and  the  sciences  of  mathematics  and  astron- 
omy flourished.  Eclipses  of  the  sun  and  moon  were  calculated  ; 
we  know  that  the  brothers  Hi  and  Ho  observed  and  calculated  the 
planetary  revolutions;1  and  we  possess  in  the  Shu  King  documents 
that  give  evidence  of  manliness  and  moral  stamina.  There  is,  for 
instance,  the  speech2  delivered  by  Yii’s  worthy  son  and  successor, 
Ch‘i,  at  Kan  in  2197  B.C.,  which  reminds  us  of  Frederick  the  Great’s 
famous  address  to  his  generals  before  th,e  battle  of  Leuthen.  No 
wonder  that  these  days  of  pristine  glory  are  still  remembered  in  the 
proverbial  expression,  “the  heaven  of  Yao  and  the  sun  of  Shun,” 
which  denotes  the  highest  prosperity  imaginable. 


are  not  to  be  attributed  to  the  Emperors  Fu-Hi  and  Yii  personally, 
we  can  safely  trust  the  old  tradition,  at  least  so  far  as  to  say,  that 


If  the  Map  of  Ho 


j|jjj  and  the  Writing  of  Loh 


1 Mayer’s  Chinese  Reader's  Manual,  Part  I.,  No.  900. 

2 Sacred  Books  of  the  East,  III.,  pp.  76-78. 


6 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


these  two  documents  (whatever  their  nature  may  have  been)  belong 
to  the  ages  represented  by  Fu-Hi  and  Yu. 


M, 

THE  YIH  77]  AND  THE  KWA 


The  ancient  kwa-philosophy,  as  we  may  call  the  system  of  com- 
prehending things  as  permutations  of  the  two  principles  Yang  and 
Yin,  plays  an  important  role  in  the  thoughts  of  the  Chinese  people 
and  forms  even  to-day  the  basis  of  their  highest  religious  conceptions, 
their  scientific  notions,  and  their  superstitions.  With  its  help  the 
origin  of  the  world  is  explained,  rules  of  conduct  are  laid  down  and 
a forecast  of  the  future  is  made. 

As  to  the  original  meaning  of  the  kwa-philosophy,  we  have 
positive  evidence  of  its  mathematical  character,  not  only  in  various 
suggestions  of  Chinese  traditions,  but  also  and  mainly  in  the  nature 
of  the  kwa  themselves.  It  is  to  be  regretted,  however,  that  in 
times  of  war  and  civil  disorder  the  historical  connexion  was  inter- 
rupted. Says  Chu  Hi  in  his  introduction  to  Cheu-tsz’ ’s  T‘ai  Kih 
T‘u  :* 

"After  the  Cheu  (dynasty)  [which  ruled  1122-255  B.  C.]  perished  and  Meng- 
Kho  died,  the  tradition  of  this  doctrine  was  not  continued. 

" When  further  the  T'sin  were  succeeded  by  the  Han,  passing  the  T sin,  Sin, 
and  T'ang,  so  as  to  arrive  at  our  Sung  [the  dynasty  under  which  Chu  Hi  lived]  and 
the  five  planets  met  in  the  K wei  (constellation)  so  as  to  usher  in  an  age  of  science 
and  erudition,  the  sage  [Cheu-tsz’]  came.” 

The  oldest  work  of  Chinese  literature  which  embodies  the  phi- 

trt 

losophy  of  Yang  and  Yin  is  the  Yih  King  (or  simply  the  Yih), 
i.  e. , the  book  of  permutations.1 2 

In  the  Yih  King  we  find  the  eight  trigrammatic  kwa  combined 
into  groups  of  hexagrammatic  kwa,  resulting  in  eight  times  eight 
or  sixty-four  permutations,  every  one  of  which  has  its  peculiar  name 
and  significance.  To  the  sixty-four  permutations  of  the  kwa  hexa- 


1 See  Gabelentz’s  German  edition  of  the  T’ai  Kih  T u,  p.  14 


a 


2 'Joe  (king)  signifies  a classical  book  of  canonical  authority;  and  7/J  (yih) 
means  " permutation  the  character  shows  the  sun  above  the  moon,  the  latter  in 
its  archaic  form.  The  translation  " change,"  which  is  commonly  adopted  by  sinolo- 
gists, does  not  always  convey  the  right  idea. 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


7 


grams  an  explanatory  text  is  added  consisting  of  seven  lines.1  The 
first  line,  written  by  Wen  Wang,2  applies  to  the  hexagram  as  a 
whole,  and  the  remaining  six,  written  by  Cheu  Rung,3  have  reference 
to  the  six  sundry  lines  of  the  hexagram,  counting  the  lowest  line  as 
the  first  and  the  topmost  as  the  sixth.  The  fulL  lines,  representing 
Yang,  are  called  kiu;  the  broken  lines,  representing  Yin,  are 
called  luk^  There  can  be  no  doubt  about  it  that  in  its  present 
form  the  Yih  King  is  chiefly  used  for  the  purpose  of  divination. 

The  most  ancient  commentaries  of  the  Yih  King  have  been  ap- 
pended to  the  book  in  the  shape  of  three  double  and  four  simple  ad- 
ditions called  the  Ten  Wings.  The  first  addition  of  two  sections, 
called  T'wan  is  commonly  ascribed  to  Wen  Wang,  the  second  called 
Siang,  to  his  son,  Cheu  Rung,  while  the  rest  belong  to  later  periods, 
containing  expositions  ascribed  to  Confucius. 

The  Yih  King  is  one  of  the  most  enigmatic  books  on  earth,  the 
mystery  of  which  is  considered  by  many  beyond  all  hope  of  solu- 
tion ; and  yet  it  exercises  even  to-day  a greater  influence  over  the 
minds  of  the  Chinese  than  does  the  Bible  in  Christian  countries. 
Its  divine  authority  is  undisputed  and  every  good  Chinese  is  confi- 
dent that  it  contains  the  sum  of  all  earthly  wisdom.  There  is  no 
Chinese  scholar  who  cherishes  the  least  doubt  that  there  is  any  truth 
in  science  or  philosophy  that  could  not  be  found  in,  and  rationally 
developed  from,  the  Yih  King. 

The  oldest  mention  of  the  Book  of  Permutations  is  made  in  the 
official  records  of  the  Cheu  dynasty,  which  succeeded  the  Yin  dy- 
nasty in  1122  B.C.  There  three  versions  of  the  Yih  are  mentioned. 
We  read  : 


4The  first  and  second  kwa  are  exceptions.  They  possess  an  additional  eighth 
line,  which  refers  to  all  the  six  I together. 

2 Wen  means  “scholar,”  or  “scholarly, ” i.  e.,  “ he  who  pursues  the  arts  of 
peace.”  Wang  means  “king.”  Wen  Wang  received  the  posthumous  title  Si  Peh , 
i.  e.,  “ Chief  of  the  West.”  His  proper  name  is  Ch'ang\  but  as  it  is  not  respectful 
to  use  the  proper  name,  he  is  commonly  called  “ Wen  Wang.” 

3 Kung  means  “duke.”  Cheu  Kung  (i;  e.,  the  Duke  of  Cheu)  was  the  fourth 
son  of  Wen  Wang  ; his  proper  name  is  Tan. 


4 The  original  meaning  of 


% 


kiu  is  ‘ ‘ nine,  ” of  lull  “six," 


8 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


“The  Grand  Diviner  had  charge  of  the  rules  for  the  three  Yih  (systems  of 
permutation),  called  the  Lien-shan,  the  Kwei  ts’ang  and  the  Yih  of  Cheu  ; in  each  of 
them  the  primary  figures  were  eight  which  were  multiplied  in  each  till  they  amounted 
to  sixty-four.” — Sacred  Books  of  the  East,  XVI,  p.  3. 


The  third  mentioned  version  of  the  Yih  is  ascribed  to  Wen 
Wang,  1231-1135  B.  C.),  and  his  son  Cheu  Kung  (1 169-1 1 16). 1 

Wen  Wang,  a man  of  unusual  piety  and  stern  justice,  was  the 
most  powerful  vassal  of  the  last  ruler  of  the  house  of  Yin,2  called 
Cheu  Sin,  “ the  dissolute  tyrant.”  When  Wen  Wang  had 
excited  the  wrath  of  Cheu  Sin  and  of  his  equally  brutal  consort, 
Ta-Ki,  by  expressing  disapproval  of  some  of  their  atrocities,  he  was 
imprisoned,  but  after  three  years  released  through  the  intercession  of 
his  son  Fa,  afterward  called  Wu  Wang.3  The  latter  sent  rich  presents 
to  Cheu  Sin  and  with  them  a beautiful  girl,  for  whose  sake  the  tyrant 
gladly  acceded  to  the  requests  of  Fa.4  While  in  prison  at  Yew  Li, 
in  1143  B.  C.,  Wen  Wang  studied  the  hexagrams  of  Fuh-Hi,  and 
comforted  himself  with  the  propitious  prophecies  which  he  believed 
he  discovered  in  their  mysterious  lines. 

When  Wen  Wang  died,  Fa  inherited  his  father’s  kingdom. 
Meanwhile  the  tyranny  of  his  suzerain,  Cheu  Sin  became  so  intol- 
erable that  even  the  tyrant’s  own  brother  K i,  the  prince  of  Wei,  fled 
to  his  court  and  appeared  before  him  with  an  iron  chain  round  his 
neck.  After  this  event  no  choice  was  left  Wu  Wang.  He  had 
either  to  betray  the  confidence  of  K'i  or  to  resist  the  unrighteous 
tyranny  of  Cheu  Sin.  In  the  spring  of  the  year  1121  B.C.  he  offered 
a solemn  sacrifice  to  Shang  Ti,  the  Lord  on  High,5  and  marched 
against  his  suzerain.  He  crossed  the  Hoang-Ho  at  the  ford  of 


JThe  ancient  rulers  of  China  are  called  emperors  or  Ti ; but  the  rulers  of  the 
dynasty  Hia  preferred  the  more  modest  title  of  King  or  Wang. 

2 The  Yin  dynasty  is  also  named  Shang. 

3 Fa,  surnamed  Wu  Wang  (i.  e the  war  king),  was  the  oldest  son  of  Wen 
Wang. 

4 Cheu  Sin  (the  dissolute  tyrant)  is  a posthumous  title.  His  proper  name  is 
“Show.”  The  word  “ Cheu  " in  the  name  Cheu  Sin  is  not  the  same  word  as  the 
name  of  the  principality  of.  "Cheu,”  after  which  the  Cheu  dynasty  is  called. 


(shang)  “above,"  “high  in  heaven,”  or  “supreme," 
peror,  sovereign.  The  etymology  of  “ ti”  is  doubtful. 


iff  ti)  Lord  em- 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


9 


Meng-tsin  and  gained  a decisive  victory  in  the  plain  of  Muh.  Cheu 
Sin  shut  himself  up  in  his  palace,  at  Luh  T'ai,  ordered  his  servants 
to  set  it  on  fire  and  died  in  its  flames  in  the  year  1122  B.  C.  Thus 
the  Yin  dynasty  was  superseded  by  the  Cheu  dynasty.  Cheu  Kung, 
Wu  Wang’s  younger  but  more  famous  brother,  contributed  much 
toward  the  consolidation  of  the  Cheu  dynasty  as  chief  counsellor, 
first  of  Wu  Wang  and  then  of  Ch'ung,  i,  e.,  “the  Perfecter,”  his 
imperial  nephew  and  successor  to  the  throne  after  Wu  Wang’s 
death.1 

There  seems  to  be  no  question  that  the  founders  of  the  Cheu 
dynasty  revised  and  rearranged  the  traditional  Kwa  systems ; and 
the  Yih  of  Cheu,  is  according  to  undisputed  tradition,  the  Book  of 
Permutations  which  is  extant  to-day. 

Tradition  preserves  two  schemes  of  the  eight  trigrams  in  the 
shape  of  a mariner’s  compass-card,  in  which  south  is  always  top- 
most. The  older  scheme  is  ascribed  to  Fuh-Hi,  and  the  later  one  to 
Wen  Wang.  Their  arrangements  are  as  follows: 


Fig.  1.  The  Trigram  According  to  Fuh-Hi.  Fig.  2.  The  Trigram  According  to  Wen  Wang 

Fuh-Hi’s  table  shows  the  Yang  and  Yin  symbols  evenly  bal- 
anced, so  that  each  couple  of  opposed  kwa  is  made  up  of  three  full 
and  three  broken  lines. 

We  are  unable  to  say  why  Wen  Wang  changed  the  more  natural 
order  of  the  Fuh-Hi  system.  Probably  he  argued  that  if  the  world 
were  arranged  in  the  evenly  balanced  way  of  the  traditional  scheme, 

:See  Victor  Strauss’s  German  translation  of  the  Shi- King , pp.  39-44. 


IO 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


it  would  not  move,  but  remain  at  rest.  Thus  he  naturally  might 
have  come  to  the  conclusion  that  change  which  is  the  condition  of 
the  actual  universe  can  only  be  due  to  a displacement  of  the  regu- 
larly arranged  order  which  would  represent  the  elements  of  exis- 
tence in  a state  of  equilibrium. 

One  of  the  arrangements  of  the  hexagrams  that  are  met  with 
in  all  the  larger  editions  of  the  Yih  King,  consists,  as  can  be  seen  in 
the  appended  diagram,  of  a square  surrounded  by  a circle. 


Fig.  3.  The  Kwa  of  Fuh-Hi  Arranged  in  Square  and  Circle. 

In  the  square  the  sixty-four  permutations  of  the  hexagrams  are 
arranged  in  the  order  of  what  may  be  called  their  natural  succession  ; 
that  is  to  say,  on  substituting  for  broken  lines  zero  (o),  and  for  full 
lines  the  figure  “ 1,”  we  can  read  the  hexagrams  as  a series  of  num- 
bers from  o to  63,  written  in  the  binary  system.  The  topmost  figure 
in  the  left  corner  represents  zero,  i.  e.  000000;  and  reading  from 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


1 1 

the  left  to  the  right,  we  have  i,  i.  e.  oooooi;  2,  i.  e.  000010;  3,  i.  e. 
00001 1 ; 4,  i.  e.  000100  ; etc.,  until  mm,  which,  in  the  decimal  sys- 
tem, is  63. 

The  circle  contains  the  same  symbols  so  arranged  that  those 
which  diametrically  face  one  another  yield  always  the  sum  of  63. 
Thus  heaven,  i.  e.  =E  or  63,  and  earth,  i.  e.  ==  or  zero,  are,  the 
former  at  the  top,  the  latter  at  the  bottom  of  the  circle.  Beginning 
with  zero  at  the  bottom,  the  numbers  ascend  from  1 to  32,  after 
which  they  reach,  in  the  topmost  place,  opposite  the  zero,  the  num- 
ber 63;  thence  they  descend  to  the  right  in  backward  order  from  62 
to  31,  which  is  the  neighbor  of  zero. 

Chinese  authors  inform  us  that  the  square  represents  the  earth, 
while  the  circle  that  surrounds  the  square  symbolises  heaven. 

There  is  another  arrangement  of  the  hexagrams,  as  follows  : 


64  63  62  61  60  39  58  57 


56  55  54  53  52  51  50  49 


48  47  46  45  44  43  42  41 


4°  39  38  37  36  35  34  33 


32  31  30  29  28  27  26  25 


24  23  22  21  20  19  18  1 7 


16  15  14  13  12  II  10  9 


7 6 5 ’ 4 3 2 1 


Fig.  4.  The  Hexagrams  According  to  Wen  Wang. 


12 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


Beginning  from  the  right  on  the  bottom  line,  the  sixty-four 
kwa1  are  arranged  in  the  order  of  the  Cheu  version,  ascribed  to 
King  Wen.  The  design  exhibits  in  the  even  columns  the  inverse 
arrangement  of  the  kwa  of  the  odd  columns,  with  this  exception,  that 
whenever  an  inversion  would  show  the  same  figure,  all  the  Yang 
lines  are  replaced  by  Yin  lines,  and  vice  versa. 

Thus  the  hexagram  No.  44,  called  “Kan”  ps  is  the  inverted 
hexagram  No.  43,  called  “ Kwai  ” while  “ K'ien,”  ^ in  No.  1, 
is  changed  into  “ Kwan ” | § in  No.  2. 


JThe  names  and  significance  of  the  several  hexagrams  depend  upon  the  com- 
bination of  the  two  trigrams  of  which  each  one  consists.  Thus,  No.  1 is  “ sky  ” upon 
“sky,”  viz.,  the  active  principle  doubled,  which  means  great  and  successful  display 
of  energy.  No.  2 is  “ earth”  upon  “ earth  the  receptive  principle  doubled,  which 
means,  great  receptivity,  fertility,  stability.  No.  3 is  “ rain  ” above  “thunder,” 
means  fulness,  boding  prosperity  to  those  who  are  constant,  but  threatening  im- 
pending danger  to  those  who  venture  to  move,  etc.  No.  49  is  “ water  ” above  “ fire,” 
which  means  contrasts  that  confront  one  another  ; to  boil  ; to  transform  (implying 
that  fire  changes  the  nature  of  water). 

The  names  of  the  hexagrams,  according  to  a Japanese  authority  (in  the  Ta- 
ka-shima-ekidan),  interpreted  in  the  sense  given  by  Western  sinologists,  mainly 
by  Harlez  (in  his  Yih  King),  are  as  follows  : 1.  K'ien,  sky,  success ; 2.  kw'un,  earth, 
stability;  3.  chun,  fulness;  4.  meng , infancy,  growth;  5.  hsii,  expectancy,  danger; 
6.  song,  litigation,  lawsuit ; 7.  see,  an  army  or  a commander ; 8.  p'i,  friendship  ; 
9.  hsido  chuh,  being  clouds  but  no  rain,  little  progress  ; 10.  li,  to  march  ; 11.  T'di 
penetration,  no  obstruction;  12.  p'ei,  obstruction,  to  be  besieged;  13.  thong  zhin 
union,  fellowship  ; 14.  taiyn,  great,  power  ; 15.  k'ien,  condescension;  16.  yii,  satis- 
faction, grandeur,  majesty  ; 17.  sui,  faithfulness,  obedience  ; 18.  ku,  care,  business, 
agitation  ; 19.  tin,  dignity,  authority  ; 20.  kwen,  manifestation,  show,  appearance  ; 
21.  shi  hoh,  slander,  censure  ; 22.  pi,  embellishment,  flash  of  light;  23.  poh,  oppres- 
sion, deprivation  ; 24.  ffth,  reaction,  return  ; 25.  wtl  wang,  openness,  sincerity;  26.  lai 
ch'uli,  accumulation  ; 27.  /,  to  sustain,  to  feed  ; 28.  ta  ksvo,  rising  of  the  great ; 29. 
k'an,  difficulties;  30.  li,  brilliancy;  31.  hien,  harmony;  32.  hong,  endurance;  33. 
fun,  to  retreat,  to  live  in  obscurity;  34.  ta  chuang,  great  strength  ; 35.  ts'in,  to 
advance;  36.  tnitigi,  descent,  eclipse,  stars;  37.  kid  zhin,  family;  38.  k'wei,  oppo- 
sition, contrariety;  39.  hien,  difficulty;  40.  kieh,  escape,  deliverance ; 41.  sun,  to 
abate,  to  lessen  ; 42.  yih,  aggrandizement,  gain;  43.  kudi,  dispersion,  distribution; 
44.  k'eii,  to  meet ; 45.  tsui,  to  assemble;  46.  shang,  to  ascend  ; 47.  k'wan,  distress ; 
48.  t sing , a well ; 49.  koh,  water  over  fire,  to  renew,  to  transform  ; 50.  ting,  fire 
over  wood,  caldron;  51.  chan,  thunder,  terror;  52.  kan,  firmness ; 53.  chien  to  in- 
choate, to  move  apace  ; 54.  kuei,  to  give  in  marriage  ; 55.  fang,  wealth  ; 56.  lit,  a 
stranger,  a traveller;  57.  sun,  pliability,  meekness;  58.  tui,  rejoicing;  59.  hwdn, 
to  flow  over,  to  squander  ; 60.  chieh,  law,  moderation  ; 61.  chung,  the  right  way,  in 
the  middle  ; 62.  hsido  kw6,  excess  in  small  things  ; 63.  ki  isi,  consummation  ; 64.  wei 
tsi,  non-consummation. 

[The  translation  of  the  names  of  the  sixty-four  kwa,  as  given  here,  only  ap- 
proximately agrees  with  the  system  elsewhere  employed  in  this  article  ] 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


13 


If  regarded  as  binary  numbers,  the  order  of  King  Wen’s  square 
reads  in  decimal  numbers  as  follows  : 


21 

42 

12 

51 

50 

19 

54 

27 

13 

44 

52 

11 

9 

36 

29 

46 

26 

22 

24 

6 

3i 

62 

35 

49 

20 

10 

53 

43 

40 

5 

60 

15 

28 

14 

45 

18 

3° 

33 

57 

39 

32 

1 

41 

37 

3 

48 

25 

38 

4 

8 

61 

47 

7 

56 

55 

59 

2 

16 

13 

58 

17 

34 

0 

63 

THE  MILFOIL  AND  THE  SPIRIT  TORTOISE 


The  divining  stalks1  and  the  tortoise-shell  have  been  in  use  in 
China  for  the  purpose  of  divination  from  time  immemorial,  for  the 
practice  of  divination  is  mentioned  in  the  oldest  documents  of  the 
Shu  King,2  where  Yu  recommends  “ the  trial  by  divination.” 

The  outfit  for  divining  ^ by  the  stalks  of  the  divining 

plant  (. Ptarmica  Sibirica ) consists  of  six  little  oblong  blocks  (like  toy 
construction-blocks)  being,  on  two  sides,  divided  by  an  incision  after 
the  pattern  of  the  broken  line  of  Yin  and  smooth  like  Yang  lines  on 
the  two  remaining  sides ; further,  of  fifty  wooden  stalks,  a little 
thicker  than  knitting-needles.  The  six  blocks  represent  Yang  lines  if 
the  smooth  side,  and  Yin  lines  if  the  incision,  is  uppermost.  The 
method  of  divination  as  prescribed  by  the  Book  of  Eki  in  the  Taka- 
shima  Ekidan  (Keigyosha,  Tokio,  1895),  is  as  follows  : 


“First  of  all,  wash  your  hands  and  mouth,  clean  your  body,  and  sit  per- 
fectly aright  in  a quiet  room,  and  then  you  may  take  hold  of  the  'sticks'  very  rev- 
erently. Fifty  sticks  make  a complete  set,  and  it  must  be  remembered  that  they 
are  the  holy  implements  which  reveal  the  will  of  the  Almighty  through  their  math- 
ematical changes.  Take  out  any  single  stick  and  let  it  stand  in  the  stickholder, 


SA  -F 


lShi  tsao  the  “divining  plant”  is  a species  of  shi  'j=J  “milfoil,”  or 

“ yarrow,"  the  same  plant  which  is  cultivated  at  the  tomb  of  Confucius.  The  sym- 
bol “ milfoil  ” is  composed  of  the  three  characters  “plant  ” on  the  top,  “old  man” 
in  the  middle,  and  “ mouth  ” or  “to  speak  ” at  the  bottom. 

2 Part  II.,  Book  II. , § 2 ; Sacred  Books  of  the  East,  III.,  p.  50. 


H 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


which  is  to  be  placed  on  the  centre  of  the  table.  This  particular  one  is  referred  to 
the  ‘Great  Origin.'  Hold  the  lower  ends  of  the  remaining  forty-nine  in  your  left 
hand,  and  slightly  dovetail  the  upper  ends.  Apply  your  right-hand  fingers  to  the 
middle  of  the  sticks,  the  thumb  being  nearest  to  you  or  from  inside,  and  the  other 
fingers  to  be  applied  from  outside.  Lift  the  whole  thing  above  your  forehead.  Now 
turn  your  sole  attention  to  the  affair  to  be  divined,  close  your  eyes,  suspend  your 
breath,  make  yourself  solemn  and  pure,  be  sure  that  you  are  in  interview  with  the 
Almighty  to  receive  his  order,  and  further,  do  not  diversify  your  thoughts  to  any- 
thing else.  At  the  moment  when  your  purity  of  heart  is  at  its  apex,  divide  the 
sticks  into  any  two  groups  with  your  right-hand  thumb.  The  division  must  not  be 
voluntary. 

"It  must  be  observed  here  that  the  moment  when  the  purity  of  one's  heart  is 
at  its  apex  is,  in  other  words,  the  moment  when  one  communicates  with  the  Al- 
mighty. The  feeling  at  the  moment  of  the  communication  is  impossible  to  describe, 
being  like  that  which  one  feels  when  electric  currents  flow  through  his  limbs.  It  is 
absolutely  necessary  that  one  shall  divide  his  sticks  at  the  very  instant  when  he  feels 
the  feeling  specified.  This  point  of  communication  baffles  every  trial  of  descrip- 
tion, the  only  way  of  acquiring  the  exact  idea  being  through  a continued  practice 
and  consequent  dexterity  of  the  student. 

"Now,  the  set  of  the  sticks  is  in  two  groups,  which  correspond  to  the  'Heaven 
and  Earth'  or  'Positive  and  Negative'  in  the  terms  of  the  'Eki.'  Place  the  right- 
hand  group  on  fhe  table,  and  take  out  one  from  the  group.  This  one  is  to  be  held 
between  the  ring  finger  and  the  little  finger  of  the  left  hand  ; the  figures  being  that 
of  the  ‘Three  Figures'  namely,  ‘Heaven,  Earth,  and  Mankind.'  Count  the  left- 
hand  group  with  your  right  hand  : it  is  to  be  counted  in  cycles,  each  cycle  being 
four  times  two  by  two,  or  eight  sticks  per  cycle.  When  any  number  of  cycles  has 
been  finished,  there  will  remain  a number  of  sticks  less  than  eight,  including  the 
one  on  the  little  finger.  This  remainder  gives  a complement  of  the  destined  dia- 
gram. 

" If  one  remains  you  have  ‘ Ken  ’ (=). 

" If  two  remain  you  have  ‘ Da  ’ (==). 

" If  three  remain  you  have  ' Ri  ’ (^H). 

1 ' If  four  remain  you  have  ‘ Shin  ’ (=E). 

“ If  five  remain  you  have  ' Son  1 (^=). 

“If  six  remain  you  have  ' Kan’  (=-=). 

' ' If  seven  remain  you  have  ' Gon  ’ (==). 

“ If  eight  or  naught  remains  you  have  ' Kon  ' (=  E).1 

" These  are  the  eight  emblems  of  'Heaven,'  'Pond,'  'Fire,'  'Thunder,'  'Wind,' 
Water,'  'Mountain,'  and  'Earth'  in  their  order.  The  trigram  corresponding  to 
the  present  remainder  is  called  the  ‘ Inner  Complement,'  and  is  to  be  placed  at  the 

1 Here  the  Japanese  pronunciation  of  the  Chinese  terms  is  preserved. 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


15 


bottom  of  the  diagram.  The  above-stated  process  is  now  to  be  repeated,  and  the 
trigram  corresponding  to  the  second  remainder  is  called  the  ‘ Outer  Complement,' 
and  is  to  be  placed  at  the  top  of  the  diagram.  Now  you  are  in  possession  of  a com- 
plete diagram  of  six  elements. 

“ The  destined  diagram  is  now  before  you  ; the  only  thing  left  is  to  observe  the 
change  in  the  ‘elements.’ 1 The  method  of  dealing  out  the  sticks  is  the  same  as  be- 
fore, except  the  mode  of  counting  them.  Here  each  cycle  consists  of  six  sticks,  so 
that  three  times  two  by  two  are  to  be  counted  per  cycle.  The  remainder  thus  ob- 
tained expresses  the  element  to  be  chosen.  If  your  remainder  is  one,  you  have 
obtained  the  first  element  of  the  diagram  ; if  two,  the  second  element,  etc.  The  order 
of  the  elements  is  numbered  from  below,  that  is  to  say,  the  bottom  element  is  the 
first,  and  the  top  one  the  sixth. 

" You  have  now  thus  obtained  an  element  of  a diagram." 

Having  thus  obtained  a definite  element  in  a definite  hexagram, 
the  diviner  turns  to  the  book  and  reads  the  sentence  belonging  to  it. 
This  sentence  is  to  him  the  oracle  that  he  receives  in  reply  to  his 
question,  and  must  be  interpreted  in  the  light  of  the  expositions 
given  concerning  the  whole  hexagram.  The  two  most  important 
lines  in  the  hexagrams  are  the  second  and  the  fifth  lines,  because 
they  constitute  the  centre  of  the  two  trigrams  of  which  the  whole  is 
composed.  The  fifth  stroke,  representing  the  efficacy  of  the  upper 
or  heavenly  power,  is  always  favorable,  and  wherever  it  is  obtained, 
it  bodes  to  the  divining  person  luck  and  unfailing  success. 

Divination  by  the  tortoise-shell  is  in  principle  the  same.  In 
the  empty  shell  of  the  sacred  tortoise,  Shan  Kwei ,2  which  is  a small 
species  of  Emys,  three  coins  are  shaken  and  thrown  out  in  a dice- 
like manner.  According  to  their  showing  heads  or  tails,  an  element 
of  one  of  the  sixty-four  hexagrams  is  determined,  and  from  a con- 
templation of  the  sentence  attached  to  the  element  of  the  hexagram, 
as  applied  to  the  given  situation,  the  outcome  of  the  proposed  action 
is  anticipated. 

The  Chinese  conception  of  the  spirituality  of  the  divining  stalks 
and  the  tortoise  shell  is  expressed  in  the  third  Appendix  of  the  Yih 
King  as  follows  : 


'Viz.,  “of  the  particular  line  in  the  hexagram." 

shan,  consists  of  “divine"  and  “to  extend”;  while  luEt 
tended  to  represent  the  general  appearance  of  a tortoise  ” (Williams). 


kwei,  is  ' ‘ in- 


i6 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


"Therefore  heaven  produced  the  spirit-like  things,1  and  the  sages  took  advan- 
tage of  them.  (The  operations  of)  heaven  and  earth  are  marked  by  (so  many) 
changes  and  transformations;  and  the  sages  imitated  them  (by  the  means  of  the 
Yi).  Heaven  hangs  out  its  (brilliant)  figures  from  which  are  seen  good  fortune  and 
bad,  and  the  sages  made  their  emblematic  interpretations  accordingly." 

Divination  is  practised  officially  in  China  by  imperial  diviners. 
We  read  in  the  counsels  of  Yu  that  Shun  submitted  the  question  of 
succession  to  divination,  and  abided  by  its  decision  in  somewhat  the 
same  way  as  among  the  Israelites  problems  of  grave  importance 
were  settled  by  consulting  the  oracle  of  Urim  and  Thummim. 

The  seventh  division  of  the  Great  Plan  gives  the  following  in- 
struction to  rulers  concerning  the  practice  of  divination  : 

"Officers  having  been  chosen  and  appointed  for  divining  by  the  tortoise-shell 
and  the  stalks  of  the  milfoil  are  to  be  charged  to  execute  their  duties.  They  will 
predict  rain,  clearing  up,  cloudiness,  want  of  connexion,  and  disturbances,  through 
the  inner  and  outer  diagrams. 

" In  all  there  are  seven  (examinations  of  doubt)  : five  given  by  the  shell,  and 
two  by  the  stalks  ; and  through  them  all  errors  can  be  discovered. 

" The  officers  having  been  appointed,  when  the  divination  is  inaugurated,  three 
men  are  to  interpret  the  indications,  and  the  consensus  of  two  of  them  is  to  be  fol- 
lowed. 

"When  you  have  doubts  about  any  great  matter,  consult  with  your  own  mind  ; 
consult  with  your  high  ministers  and  officers;  consult  with  the  common  people  ; 
consult  with  the  tortoise-shell  and  divining  stalks. 

"If  you,  the  shell,  the  stalks,  the  ministers  and  officers,  and  the  common  peo- 
ple, all  agree  about  a course,  it  is  called  a great  concord,  and  the  result  will  be  the 
welfare  of  your  person  and  good  fortune  to  your  descendants. 

"If  you,  the  shell,  and  the  stalks  agree,  while  the  ministers  and  officers  and 
the  common  people  oppose,  the  result  will  be  fortunate. 

" If  the  ministers  and  officers,  with  the  shell  and  stalks,  agree,  while  you  and 
the  common  people  oppose,  the  result  will  be  fortunate. 

"If  the  common  people,  the  shell,  and  the  stalks  agree,  while  you,  with  the 
ministers  and  officers,  oppose,  the  result  will  be  fortunate. 

" If  you  and  the  shell  agree,  while  the  stalks,  with  the  ministers  and  officers 
and  the  common  people,  oppose,  internal  operations  will  be  fortunate,  and  external 
undertakings  unlucky. 

"When  the  shell  and  stalks  are  both  opposed  to  the  views  of  men.  there  will 
be  good  fortune  in  being  still,  and  active  operations  will  be  unlucky.” 


JThe  divining  stalks  and  the  divine  tortoise-shell 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


17 


In  justice  to  the  original  Chinese  conception  of  divination  we 
must  state  that  it  was  not  intended  to  discover  future  events,  but  to 
ascertain  whether  or  not  certain  plans  contemplated  for  execution 
would  be  propitious.  The  tortoise-shell  and  the  stalks  are  called 
spiritual,  not  because  they  were  supposed  to  be  animated  by  spirits, 
but  because,  like  books  and  pens,  they  can  be  employed  for  the  fixa- 
tion and  clarification  of  thought.  Sz’  Ma,  the  most  skilful  diviner  in 
the  time  of  Ts‘in  (fifteenth  century),  is  reported  in  the  Lin  Chi  of  the 
Ming  dynasty  to  have  said  to  Shao  P'ing  : 

1 ' What  intelligence  is  possessed  by  things  spiritual  ? They  are  intelligent  (only) 
by  their  connexion  with  men.  The  divining  stalks  are  so  much  withered  grass  ; the 
tortoise-shell  is  a withered  bone.  They  are  but  things,  and  man  is  more  intelligent 
than  things.  Why  not  listen  to  yourself  instead  of  seeking  (to  learn)  from  things  ? ” 

Spiritual  accordingly  does  not  mean  possessing  spirit  in  the 
sense  of  being  animated  ; it  means  that  which  is  significant  or  is 
possessed  of  meaning. 


THE  MAP  OF  HO 


AND  THE  WRITING  OF  LOH 


The  first  authentic  passages  in  which  the  map  of  Ho 

and  - 1 1'-  the  writing  of  Loh  are  mentioned,  date  as  far  back  as 


the  age  of  Confucius.  We  read  in  the  Yih  King,  Appendix  III.,  73  : 


“The  Ho  gave  forth  the  map,  and  theLo  the  writing." — S.  B.  E . , XVI.,  p.  374. 
In  the  Lun  Yu  (the  Confucian  Dialogues),  V.,  7,  we  read  that 
Confucius  said  in  an  hour  of  dejection  : 

“The  bird  Feng  does  not  longer  reappear,  from  the  river  no  map  comes  up 
again  : 1 I am  disappointed  in  my  expectations.” 


The  first  author  who  appears  to  have  given  a definite  shape  to 
the  legends  of  the  map  of  Ho  and  the  writing  of  Loh  is  K'ung 
Ngan-Kwoh,  a descendant  of  Confucius  (second  century,  B.C.).  He 


JThis  means  in  other  words  that  divine  revelation  by  a direct  supernatural  in- 
terference has  ceased.  The  bird  Feng  (Fig.  6,  p.  18)  is  like  the  Phoenix  a mythical 
creature  whose  appearance  is  said  to  announce  great  events.  Feng , the  Chinese 
Phoenix,  and  lung,  the  dragon,  are  favorite  subjects  of  Chinese  artists.  The  female 
of  the  Phoenix  is  called  Hwang , hence  the  generic  term  Feng-Hwang,  which  is  the 
emblem  of  conjugal  happiness.  Linig,  the  dragon  (Fig.  5,  p.  18),  is  the  emblem  of 
power  ; hence  it  is  the  imperial  coat-of  arms. 


i8 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


speaks  of  the  dragon-horse  that  emerged  from  the  waters  of  the 
Yellow  River  and  presented  on  its  back  an  arrangement  of  symbols, 
whence  the  divine  ruler  Fuh-Hi,  derived  his  philosophy.  Concern- 
ing the  writing  of  Loh,  K'ung  Ngan-Kwoh  adds  that  while  Yu  was 
engaged  in  draining  the  flood  a spirit  tortoise  appeared  to  him 
which  “carried  on  its  back  a scroll  of  writing  and  a system  of  divi- 
sions, in  both  respects  exhibiting  the  numbers  up  to  nine.” 

There  is  but  one  celebrated  Chinese  scholar,  Ow-yang  Sin,  who 
ventured  to  express  disbelief  in  the  legend  while  the  schoolmen  of 
the  Sung  dynasty  devoted  themselves  to  a reconstruction  of  the 


Fig.  5.  Lung,  the  Dragon.  (As  it  appears  in 
the  imperial  standard.)  The  lung  is  “ the  chief  of 
scaly  beings.”  It  symbolises  the  watery  principle 
of  the  atmosphere.  Cosmogonists  mention  four 
kinds.  In  addition  we  read  of  the  yellow  dragon 
(the  same  that  emerged  from  the  river  Loh)  and 
the  azure  dragon. 


Fig.  6.  The  Bird  Feng.  (After  a 
Chinese  drawing.  Reproduced  from  the 
Chinese  Repository .) 


map  of  Ho  and  the  writing  of  Loh.  The  schemes  that  have  gradually 
been  accepted  are  the  two  diagrams  reproduced  on  p.  19  from  a Chi- 
nese edition  of  the  Yih  King.  They  were  elaborated  by  Tsai  Yuen- 
Ting  who  lived  under  the  Hwei  Tsung  dynasty  (1101-1125  A.  D.). 

The  Ho  T u,  or  map  of  the  Ho,  according  to  Ts'ai  Yuen-Ting, 
shows  the  odd  numbers  1,  3,  5,  7,  and  9 in  white  dots  or  Yang  sym- 
bols, and  the  even  numbers  2,  4,  6,  8,  and  10  in  dark  dots  or  Yin 
symbols.  (See  Fig.  7.)  This  is  based  upon  the  theory  of  the  Con- 
fucian  commentary  of  the  Yih  King,  which  reads  as  follows  : 


“ The  number  1 belongs  to  heaven  ; to  earth,  2 ; to  heaven,  3 ; to  earth,  4 ; 
to  heaven,  5 ; to  earth,  6 ; to  heaven,  7;  to  earth,  8 ; to  heaven,  9 ; to  earth,  10. 

“ The  numbers  belonging  to  heaven  are  five,  and  those  belonging  to  earth  are 
five.  The  numbers  of  these  two  series  correspond  to  each  other  (in  their  fixed  posi- 
tions), and  each  one  has  another  that  may  be  considered  its  mate.  The  heavenly 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


19 


numbers  amount  to  25,  and  the  earthly  to  30.  The  numbers  of  heaven  and  earth 
together  amount  to  55.  It  is  by  these  that  the  changes  and  transformations  are 
effected,  and  the  spirit-like  agencies  kept  in  movement." 


(According  to  Ts'ai  Yuang-ting;  reproduced  from  a Chinese  edition  of  the  Yih  King.) 

The  arrangement  of  the  twenty-five  positive  or  Yang  and  thirty 
negative  or  Yin  elements,  is  such  as  to  make  five  the  difference  in 
each  group  of  dots.  When  we  substitute  for  Yang  -|-,  and  for  Yin 
— , the  Map  of  the  Ho  appears  as  follows  : 


+ 7 — 2 
= + 5 

-8+3 

— 10+5 

+9—4 

= + 5 

—6+1 

The  writing  of  Loh,  reproduced  (Fig.  8)  from  the  same  source, 
consists  of  a magic  square  as  follows  : 

492 

3 5 7 
8 1 6 

The  sum  of  each  line  of  three  numbers  in  any  direction,  verti- 
cally, horizontally,  and  diagonally,  is  fifteen. 


20 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


Although  these  two  arithmetical  devices  of  the  map  of  Ho  and 
the  writing  of  Loh  according  to  Ts'ai  Yuen-Ting  are  spoken  of  as 
commonly  accepted,  we  find  another  and  almost  more  popular 
scheme  of  unknown  origin  and  perhaps  of  greater  antiquity,  accord- 
ing to  which  the  map  of  Ho  on  the  back  of  the  river-horse  is  said 
to  exhibit  the  eight  kwa,  as  represented  in  the  adjoining  illustration 
(see  Fig.  9),  and  the  writing  of  Loh  on  the  back  of  the  tortoise  is 
identified  with  the  five  elements  (see  Fig.  10). 

The  inscription  above  the  dragon  horse  reads  from  the  right  to 
the  left  “Lung  ma  fu  t‘u,”  i.  e.  dragon  horse  carrying  map. 


Fig.  9.  The  Dragon  Horse  Carrying  the  Map. 


Fig.  10.  The  Tortoise  with  the  Writing.1 


The  five  elements  ^ ^^J*1 2  according  to  Chinese  notions,  are 

water,  wood,  fire,  metal,  and  earth.3 


1 Drawn  after  the  photograph  of  a specimen  in  the  possession  of  Dr.  H.  Riedel 

The  writing  of  the  five  elements  which  might  be  similarly  traced  in  various  ways, 

is  unduly  emphasised,  for  the  purpose  of  showing  it  at  a glance. 


/; 


-17  hing=  "element”  exhibits  two  characters,  "a  step  with  the  left  foot,’ 
and  "a  step  with  the  right  foot,"  which  combined  denote  "motion.”  The  elements, 
accordingly,  are  " the  moving  ones,”  or  " the  active  agents.” 


1 skui,  ^ muh,  /< 


vIa  kin,  and 


£ 


T'u.  Shui=“  water” 


u 

muh , /\  /two, 

is  in  its  original  form  the  picture  of  three  ripples  ; muh  = "wood,”  the  picture  of 
a tree  with  its  roots  ; hwo  = " fire  ” represents  an  ascending  flame  ; T'u=“  earth  ” 
denotes  the  place  on  which  to  stand  ; and  kin  — " metal  or  gold  ” is  said  to  contain 
the  character  T'u  = " earth,"  because  the  metals  come  from  the  ground. 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


21 


They  were,  in  old  Chinese  characters,1  written  as  follows  : 


We  need  little  imagination  to  trace  these  characters  on  the  shell 
of  a tortoise,  such  as  sketched  in  the  drawing  on  page  20  (Fig.  10). 

The  five  elements  play  a very  important  part  in  the  thoughts  of 
the  Chinese.  In  their  symbolical  significance  they  represent  the 
properties  or  actions  that  appear  to  be  inherent  in  them.  Their 
conception  is  of  considerable  antiquity,  for  it  is  mentioned  in  the 
Great  Plan  of  the  Shu  King. 

Tseu  Yen,  a philosopher  who  lived  in  the  fourth  century  before 
Christ,  is  reported  to  have  composed  treatises  on  cosmogony  and  the 
influences  of  the  five  elements.  Other  sages  who  wrote  on  the  same 
subject  are  Liu  Hiang  of  the  first  century  before  Christ,  and  Pan 
Ku  of  the  first  century  after  Christ. 

When  an  idea  has  once  gained  a foothold  in  the  Chinese  mind,  it 
stays.  Such  is  the  case  with  the  notion  of  the  five  elements,  which 
forms  an  ineradicable  part  of  the  Chinese  world-view,  so  that  even 
Cheu-tsz’,  the  most  independent  thinker  of  later  generations,  em- 
bodied it  in  his  philosophy. 


THE  GREAT  PLAN 


IN  NINE  DIVISIONS 


The  Count  of  Chi,  the  grand  master  at  the  court  of  Shang,  in 
the  time  of  the  tyrant  Cheu  Sin,  said  once  that  if  ruin  overtook  the 
house  of  Shang,  he  would  never  be  the  servant  of  another  dynasty. 
Having  displeased  Cheu  Sin,  he  was  put  into  prison,  and  when  the 
former  died  in  the  flames  of  his  burning  palace,  his  conqueror,  Wu 
Wang,  released  the  grand  master  from  prison,  but  the  latter, 
faithful  to  his  vow,  refused  to  acknowledge  his  liberator  as  the 
legitimate  sovereign  of  China.  Wu  Wang,  honoring  the  indepen- 
dent spirit  of  the  Count,  allowed  him  to  leave  the  country  for 
Corea,  and  invested  him  with  that  territory.  Hereupon  the  Count 
felt  constrained  to  appear  at  the  court  of  Cheu,  when  consulted  by 


1 In  the  so-called  seal  characters,  the  forms  of  s/mi  and  muh  appear  less  angular 
and  are  rounded  at  the  corners. 


22 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


Wu  Wang  on  the  principles  of  government,  and  communicated  to 
Great  Plan,1  with  its  nine  divisions.  Its  trans- 
lator, Professor  Legge,  says : 

“The  Great  Plan  means  the  great  model  for  the  government  of  the  nation, — 
the  method  by  which  the  people  may  be  rendered  happy  and  tranquil,  in  harmony 
with  their  condition,  through  the  perfect  character  of  the  king,  and  his  perfect  ad- 
ministration of  government.” 

The  Great  Plan  is  preserved  among  the  documents  of  Cheu, 
but  it  is  generally  supposed  to  be  of  much  older  date.  Says  Legge  : 

“ That  the  larger  portion  of  it  had  come  down  from  the  times  of  Hsia  is  not 
improbable.  The  use  of  the  number  nine  and  other  numbers,  and  the  naming  of 
the  various  divisions  of  the  Plan,  are  in  harmony  with  Yu’s  style  and  practice  in 
his  Counsels.  We  are  told  in  the  introductory  sentences  that  Heaven  or  God  gave 
the  Plan  with  its  divisions  to  Yu." 

The  Great  Plan  is  interesting  as  a sample  of  Chinese  philos- 
ophy. Its  metaphysical  basis  consists  in  a mystical  play  with  num- 
bers, the  reasons  of  which  can  no  longer  be  fully  appreciated  ; it 
contains  a great  many  confused  notions  of  physics,  mixed  with 
divination  and  astrology,  and  in  addition  some  very  practical  injunc- 
tions for  the  moral  conduct  of  rulers.  The  nine  divisions2  of  the 
Great  Plan  are  as  follows  : 

1.  The  five  elements. — They  are  characterised  as  follows  : 

“ The  nature  of  water  is  to  soak  and  descend  ; of  fire,  to  blaze  and  ascend  ; of 
wood,  to  be  crooked  or  straight;  of  metal,  to  yield  and  change;  of  the  earth,  to 
receive  seeds  and  yield  harvests.  That  which  soaks  and  descends  becomes  salty  ; 
that  which  blazes  and  ascends  becomes  bitter  ; that  which  is  now  crooked  and  now 
straight  becomes  sour  ; that  which  yields  and  changes  becomes  acrid  ; and  from  seed- 
sowing and  harvesting  comes  sweetness.” 

2.  Reverent  attention  to  the  five  points  of  conduct. — It  pre- 
scribes (i)  for  deportment,  a reverent  attitude,  (2)  for  speech,  pro- 


him  the  "V 


1 1A  hung,  literally  “vast,  immense,”  but  in  connexion  with  /a«=plan, 
the  word  is  commonly  translated  “great.”  The  character  consists  of  “water,1 
which  is  the  same  radical  as  in  the  names  Ho  and  Loh,  and  of  “all,"  its  original  sig- 
nificance being  “inundation.”  See  Williams,  Syllabic  Dictionary  of  the  Chinese 
Language,  p.  236. 


I * 

2Ppiy  (ch'eu  = division)  consists  of  “field  "and  “longlife." 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


23 


priety,  (3)  for  seeing,  clearness  of  vision,  (4)  for  hearing,  distinc- 
tion, (5)  for  thinking,  acumen.  By  the  observation  of  these  five 
points  of  conduct  will  be  insured  (1)  gravity,  (2)  decorum,  (3)  cir- 
cumspection, (4)  discernment,  (5)  wisdom. 

3.  Earnest  devotion  to  the  eight  objects  of  government. — They 
are  (1)  the  provision  of  food  for  the  people,  (2)  the  acquisition  of 
wealth,  (3)  the  performance  of  sacrifices,  (4)  the  regulation  of  labor, 
(5)  the  organisation  of  instruction,  (6)  the  suppression  of  crime,  (7) 
the  entertainment  of  guests,  and  (8)  the  maintenance  of  the  army. 

4.  The  five  arrangers  of  time. — They  are  (1)  the  year,  (2)  the 
moon,  (3)  the  sun,  (4)  the  planets  and  the  zodiacal  divisions,  and 
{3)  calendar  calculations. 

5.  The  ideal  of  royal  perfection. — It  is  characterised  in  the 
following  lines  : 

“Without  deflection,  without  halting, 

Pursue  the  royal  righteousness. 

Without  selfish  preference, 

Pursue  the  royal  way. 

Without  selfish  prejudice, 

Pursue  the  royal  path. 

Avoid  deflection,  avoid  partiality; — 

Broad  and  long  is  the  royal  way. 

Avoid  partiality,  avoid  deflection  ; — 

Level  and  easy  is  the  royal  way. 

Avoid  perversity,  avoid  one-sidedness  ; — 

Correct  and  straight  is  the  royal  way. 

(Ever)  seek  for  this  perfect  excellence, 

(Ever)  turn  to  this  perfect  excellence. 

“This  ideal  of  royal  perfection  is  unalterable  and  implies  a command  ; — yea, 
it  is  a command  of  the  Lord  on  High. 

“All  the  multitudes  of  the  people,  instructed  in  this  ideal  of  perfect  excellence, 
will,  by  carrying  it  into  practice,  partake  of  the  glory  of  the  Son  of  Heaven.  They 
will  say:  ' The  Son  of  Heaven  is  the  father  of  the  people,  and  the  sovereign  of  all 
nations  under  the  sky.'  ” 

6.  The  three  virtues  of  a ruler  are  righteousness,  severity,  and 
clemency.  The  first  must  be  practised  in  times  of  tranquillity,  the 
second  serves  to  put  down  disorder,  and  the  third  applies  to  high- 
minded  persons. 


24 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


7.  The  examination  of  doubts  prescribes  the  directions  of  divi- 
nation, as  explained  above.  (See  p.  16.) 

8.  The  eight  ways  of  verification  are  astrological  rules  for  the 
prevention  of  misfortunes.  Rain,  sunshine,  heat,  cold,  and  wind 
must  be  seasonable,  lest  evil  originate.  Gravity  in  deportment  pro- 
duces rain,  propriety  sunshine,  prudence  heat,  circumspection  cold, 
and  wisdom  wind,  each  in  season.  The  king  should  examine  the 
year,  the  ministers  the  months,  the  officers  the  days,  in  order  to  insure 
peace  and  prosperity.  If  the  seasonableness  is  interrupted,  there  will 
be  failure  of  crops  and  misgovernment.  If  great  men  are  kept  in  ob- 
scurity, there  will  be  unrest.  The  chapter  concludes  : “The  stars 
should  be  observed  by  the  people  at  large.  Some  stars  love  wind, 
and  others  love  rain  ; the  courses  of  the  sun  and  moon  determine 
winter  and  summer.  The  way  in  which  the  moon  follows  the  stars 
produces  wind  and  rain.” 

9.  The  five  sources  of  happiness  are  (1)  long  life,  (2)  riches, 
(3)  health  and  equanimity,  (4)  virtue,  and  (5)  obedience  to  the  will 
of  heaven  ; and  the  six  sources  of  misery  are  (1)  shortness  of  life, 
(2)  sickness,  (3)  anxiety,  (4)  poverty,  (5)  wickedness,  and  (6)  lack 
of  character.1 

In  spite  of  its  lack  of  system  and  its  diverse  aberrations  from 
the  straight  path  of  sound  logic,  the  Great  Plan  has  exercised,  on 
account  of  its  moral  ingredients,  a beneficial  influence  upon  the  de- 
velopment of  China.  Yet  even  here  there  is  a drawback,  in  so  far 
as  the  basis  of  Chinese  ethics  consists  merely  in  reverence  for  the 
past,  for  parents,  and  for  authority  in  any  form  ; it  lacks  the  most 
essential  elements  that  give  character  to  conduct,  which  are  inde- 
pendence of  thought,  the  courage  of  individual  responsibility,  and 
bold  progressiveness. 

THE  T'AI  KIH,  "f ^ THE  ULTIMATE  GROUND  OF  EXISTENCE. 

The  insufficiency  of  the  dualism  which  finds  expression  in  this 
contrast  of  the  Yang  and  Yin  principles,  must  have  made  itself  felt 

JIt  is  hard  to  understand  why  in  one  case  there  are  five,  and  in  an  other  six 


sources. 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


25 


very  early,  for  the  Chinese  philosophy,  as  it  appears  in  all  the  clas- 
sics, exhibits  a decided  tendency  towards  monism.  The  Yang  and 
Yin  are  thought  to  have  originated  in  a process  of  differentiation 
from  the  T‘ai  Kih,  which  is  “the  grand  origin,”  der  Urgrund,  the 
source  of  existence ; Gabelentz  translates  it,  das  Urprhizip,  Legge  and 
other  English  sinologists,  “the  grand  terminus,”  or  “the  grand 
extreme.”  Its  symbol  is  a circle,  thus  O- 

The  word  T‘ai,  X “great”  or  “grand,”  is  akin  to  Ta, 

“ great  ” or  “ large  it  implies  that  the  greatness  is  not  of  size,  but 
of  dignity. 


Gabelentz  defines  the  word  jwjl  Kih1  as  follows  : 


“ Kih  originally  signified,  as  is  indicated  by  its  radical  (which  is  No.  75,  ' tree,’ 
or  ‘ wood  '),  the  ridge-pole  in  the  gable  of  a house.  Because  it  is  the  topmost  part  of 
the  building,  the  term  is  used  of  all  topmost  and  extreme  points.  Since  we  cannot 
go  beyond  the  top  of  the  gable,  but  only  cross  over  to  descend  on  the  other  side  of 
the  roof,  Kih  means  ‘goal,’  or  ‘turning-point.’  This  latter  meaning  implies  the 
idea  of  neutrality,  which  is  neither  on  this  nor  on  that  side.  As  is  well  known,  the 
Chinese  words  possess  the  functions  of  various  parts  of  speech.  Thus  Kih,  as  ad- 
verb, means  1 very,  highly,  extremely  ’;  as  a verb,  1 to  reach  the  goal,  to  exhaust.’  " 


The  T‘ai  Kih  is  not  mentioned  in  the  body  of  the 

text  of  the  Yih  King,  but  is  commonly  believed  to  be  implied  in  its 
secret  teaching.  This  opinion  appears  to  have  been  established  as 
early  as  the  time  of  Confucius,  who  is  reported  to  have  said  : 


“Therefore  in  the  Yih  is  contained  the  great  origin,  which  produced  the  two 
elementary  forms  [viz.,  Yang  and  Yin],  The  two  elementary  forms  produced  the 
eight  trigrams.  The  eight  trigrams  served  to  determine  good  and  evil,  and  from 
their  determination  was  produced  the  great  world." — Yih  King,  App.  III.,  §§70-71. 


Legge  criticises  the  author  of  this  paragraph,  because  there  is 
no  way  of  deriving  the  full  and  broken  lines,  representing  Yang  and 
Yin,  from  the  circle,  and  we  grant  that  there  is  a gap  here.  The 
transition  from  the  Yang-and-Yin  dualism  to  the  monism  of  the 
T‘ai  Kih  did  not  find  its  appropriate  symbol.  Nevertheless,  we  can 
understand  that  the  idea  necessarily  originated.  Wang  Pi,2  a cele- 


1 See  also  Williams,  S.  D.  of  the  Ch.  L.,  p.  393. 

2Although  Wang  Pi  died  at  the  early  age  of  twenty-four  years,  his  authority  in 
the  mystic  lore  of  the  Yih  King  was  so  great  that  he  is  looked  upon  as  the  founder  of 
the  modern  school  of  divination. — Mayer's  Chinese  Reader' s Manual , I.  /.,  No.  812. 


26 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


brated  scholar  of  the  Wei  dynasty  (born  225  A.  D.),  (as  quoted  by 
Legge,  il>.)  says: 

“Existence  must  begin  in  non-existence,  and  therefore  the  Grand  Terminus 
produced  the  two  elementary  forms.  Thai  A'i  [viz.  Tai  Kih,  the  grand  terminus] 
is  the  denomination  of  what  has  no  denomination.  As  it  cannot  be  named,  the  text 
takes  the  extreme  point  of  anything  that  exists  as  an  analogous  term  for  the  Thai  A i.’ 

Professor  Legge  adds  : 

“ Expanding  Wang’s  comment,  Khung  Ying-ta  says  : ‘ Thai  A'i  [viz.  T ai  Kih] 
means  the  original  subtle  matter,  that  formed  the  one  chaotic  mass  before  heaven  and 
earth  were  divided  ; ’ and  then  he  refers  to  certain  passages  in  Lao-tsze’s  Tao-Teh- 
King,  and  identifies  the  Thai  A'i  with  his  Tao.  This  would  seem  to  give  to  Thai  A'i 
a material  meaning.  The  later  philosophers  of  the  Sung  school,  however,  insist  on 
its  being  immaterial,  now  calling  it  li,  the  principle  of  order  in  nature,  now  tao,  the 
defined  course  of  things,  now  Ti,  the  Supreme  Power  or  God,  now  shan,  the  spirit- 
ual working  of  God.  According  to  A7/ang-tsze  [Confucius],  all  these  names  are  to 
be  referred  to  that  of  ’Heaven,’  of  which  they  express  so  many  different  concepts.” 


We  here  reproduce  a diagram  of  the  evolution  of  the  Kwa 
from  the  Great  Extreme,  which,  so  far  as  we  know,  has  never  been 
reproduced  in  any  Western  translation  of  the  Yih  King. 


ft  # ra  + 


Fig.  11.  The  Design  of  Kwa-Evolution  from  the  Great  Extreme. 
(From  a Chinese  edition  of  the  Yih  King.) 


The  eight  characters  of  the  title  in  Fig.  11  read  from  the  right 


to  the  left : 


ft 


Fuh  Hi’s  six 


ty  |^[  four  ^]>  Kwa  serially 


(or  in  their  development)  represented. 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


27 


The  marginal  notes  from  below  upward  read  “the  great  ex- 
treme,” “the  two  7”  (or  primordial  forms),  “the  four  Siang  or 
figures,”  “the  eight  kwa, ” “the  sixteen  kwa,”  “the  thirty-two 
kwa,”  “the  sixty-four  kwa.” 

The  inscriptions  in  the  two  large  black  and  white  rectangles 
immediately  above  the  circle  read  from  the  right  to  the  left  “yin” 
and  “yang,”  in  the  second  line  from  below  consisting  of  two  black 
and  two  white  rectangles,  “the  great  yin,”  “the  small  yang,”  “the 
small  yin,”  “the  great  yang,”  in  the  third  line  “ch‘ien,  tui,  lx,  chan, 
siuen,  k‘an,  kan,  and  kw‘un,”  which  are  the  names  of  the  eight 
Kwa,  as  quoted  above.  The  thirty-two  Kwa  have  no  names.  The 
names  of  the  sixty-four  hexagrams  are  written  in  the  Chinese  original 
over  the  small  sixty-four  rectangles  at  the  top.  They  are  here  omit- 
ted because  they  would  have  appeared  blurred  in  the  present  repro- 
duction, which  is  considerably  reduced. 

If  we  fold  the  diagram  in  the  middle  we  find  that  the  yin  and 
yang  differentiations  of  the  great  origin  cancel  one  another  and  the 
whole  world  sinks  back  into  nought.  This  symbolises  the  omneity 
of  the  zero,  which  will  illustrate  what  Chinese  thinkers  mean  when 
they  speak  with  reverence  of  the  great  nothing,  of  emptiness,  of 
non-action,  of  non-existence,  and  of  Nirvana.  To  them  it  represents 
the  omnipresence  of  the  Deity  in  the  All.  It  is  that  which  remains 
unchanged  in  all  changes,  the  law  in  apparent  irregularity  and 
chaos,  the  eternal  in  the  transient,  the  absolute  in  the  relative,  the 
universal  in  the  particular,  and  rest  in  motion. 

We  are  not  accustomed  to  negative  terms  in  just  this  sense, 
but  they  are  not  entirely  absent  in  Western  literature.  Thus  Goethe 
says : 

11  Und  a lies  Drangen,  al/es  Ringen 
1st  ew’ge  Ruh ’ in  Gott  dem  Herrn." 

[Yet  all  the  strife  and  all  resistance 
In  God,  the  Lord,  's  eternal  rest.] 


THE  MONISM  OF  CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY,  OR  CHEU-TSZ’  ’S 

PHILOSOPHY. 


The  monism  implied  in  the  unitary  and  ultimate  principle  of 
the  T‘ai  Kih  was  worked  out  by  Cheu  Tun-i,  commonly  called  Cheu- 


28 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


EXPLANATIONS  : 

Cheu-tsz’  says  in  the  T'ai  kih  t‘u : 

| i.  “ Having  no  cause  {Kih — 
principle,  origin,  limit),  therefore 
the  grand  (original)  cause.” 

[This  statement  may  be  com- 
pared to  Spinoza's  theory  of  the 
uncaused  causa  ra/.] 


myriads 
of  things  Mjj 
through  J\t 

change  rG 


originate 


£ 


It... 

rests 


§2.  “The  grand  cause  moves,  thus 
producing  Yang.  Having  reached 
the  limit,  however,  it  rests.  Resting 
it  produces  Yin.  Having  rested  to 
the  limit  again,  it  moves.  Once 
moving,  once  resting;  one  state 
being  conditioned  by  the  other.  In 
separation  it  is  (here)  Yin,  in  sepa- 
ration it  is  (there)  Yang.  Thus  the 

two  fundamental  forms  (viz. 

and  — — ) are  fixed." 


, § 3-  “Yang  changes,  Yin  is  added. 

Thus  are  pr0(juce(j  water, fire,  wood, 
metal,  and  earth.  The  five  kinds 
of  weather  are  distributed.  The 
four  seasons  come  forth.” 

[Fire  and  wood  belong  to  the 
Yang,  tvater  and  metal  to  the  Yin; 
while  earth,  standing  in  the  centre, 
metal  is  neutral.] 


iff* 

M. 


§ 4.  “The  five  elements  if  united 
Kw'un's  ate  Yin  and  Yang.  Yin  and  Yang 
if  united  are  the  grand  cause  {Kih). 
The  grand  cause  is  without  cause, 
norm  The  five  elements  receive  at  their 
origin,  each  one  its  own  nature.” 


[The  circle  indicates  that  the  five 
elements,  when  combined,  can  be 
regarded  as  magnitudes  of  plus  and 
minus  which  in  their  sum  equal  the 
male  zero  of  the  T'ai  kih.] 


§ 5.  “ The  truth  of  that  which  has 
no  cause,  the  efficacy  of  the  Two 
(viz. the  two  forms  , and  — — and 
of  the  Five  (viz.  the  five  elements) 
in  a wonderful  way,  now  combine 
and  now  separate.  The  K'ien's 
(^=)  norm  is  male,  the  Kw'un’s  = = 
norm  is  female.  Both  aspirations 
quicken  one  another,  and  through 
transformations  they  produce  all 
things.  All  things  are  produced  in 
a process  of  production.  Thus 
change  and  transformation  are  in- 


IThe  “myriads  of  things"  is  a common  phrase  in  Chi- 


finite.” 


nese,  denoting  the  Universe. 


Fig.  12.  Cheu-tsz’  ’s  Diagram  of  the  Great  Origin.  [After  Von  Gabelenlz.] 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


29 


tsz’,  i.  e.  Cheu  the  Sage,  who  lived  1017-1073.  We  do  not  hesitate 
to  say  that  Cheu-tsz’  is  the  first  systematic  thinker  of  China ; he 
certainly  deserves  the  honorary  title,  Tao-Kwoh-Kung,  “Prince  in 
the  Empire  of  Reason,”  conferred  upon  him  after  death.  Lao-tsz’ 
may  be  deeper,  Confucius  more  influential,  Mencius  more  versatile, 
but  none  of  them  is  more  methodical,  none  of  them  is  more  precise 
and  clear  in  comprehension  than  Cheu-tsz’,  and  there  is  only  one 
who,  in  this  particular  line,  is  his  equal : his  great  disciple,  Chu  Hi. 

Cheu-tsz’  dnd  his  school  have  systematised  and  completed  the 
philosophical  world-conception  of  the  Chinese.  Whatever  the  an- 
cient traditions  may  have  been,  they  are  now  understood  in  China 
as  interpreted  by  Cheu-tsz’  and  Chu-Hi. 

Thomas  Taylor  Meadows  says  of  Cheu-tsz’  in  his  book,  The 
Chinese  and  Their  Rebellions,  p.  358. 

"It  is  in  the  spirit  of  coalescence,  and  with  a full  personal  faith  in  a virtual 
identity  of  the  teachings  of  the  Sacred  Books,  that  all  Cheu-tsz’  's  annotations  and 
commentaries  were  conceived.  This  circumstance,  which  rendered  it  unnecessary 
for  his  countrymen,  in  adopting  his  views,  to  discard  any  part  of  what  they  had 
long  so  highly  esteemed  ; together  with  the  fact  that  his  style  combined,  in  a won- 
derful degree,  simplicity  with  completeness  and  lucidity  with  eloquence,  procured 
unmistakable  supremacy  for  his  writings  soon  after  his  death  ; and  constituted  him 
the  definitive  fashioner  of  the  Chinese  mind.” 


Cheu-tsz’  has  written  a great  number  of  works,  but  only  two 
have  come  down  to  our  times  ; they  are  the  Afctsi  T‘ai 
Kih  Tlu,  or  the  diagram  of  the  Great  Origin,  and  the  T‘ung  Shu 1 
^|||  ^ f j-  or  “general  treatise,”  which  found  an  expositor  in  Chu- 
Hi  (1130-1200  A.  D.).  Both  books  are  excellently  translated  into 
German  the  former  by  Gabelentz,2  the  latter  in  part  by  W.  Grube. 

Cheu-tsz’  condenses  the  contents  of  his  treatise  on  the  Grand 
Extreme  in  a diagram  which  is  here  reproduced.  (See  Fig.  12,  p.  28.) 


1 W.  T'ung,  general,  universal,  abstract,  [ ~ T Shu,  writing,  treatise,  book 

The  T'ung  Shu  is  the  second  chapter  of  the  Sing  li  ta  tseuen. 

When  at  the  request  of  Emperor  Kanghi  an  abridged  edition  of  the  philosoph- 
ical encyclopaedia  was  published  in  1717,  both  treatises  of  Cheu-tsz'  were  again  em- 
bodied in  the  collection  in  their  complete  form  together  with  Chu-Hi’s  annotations. 
This  proves  the  high  esteem  in  which  these  two  thinkers  are  held  in  China,  and, 
indeed,  their  opinions  are  recognised  as  the  standard  of  Chinese  orthodoxy. 

2 T'ai  Kih  T u des  Tscheu  Tsi,  Tafel  des  Urprincipes  mit  Tschu-HV s Commen- 


30 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


The  first  sentence  of  the  T‘ung  Shu  reads  : 


1$ 


SQ 


A t.  A 


“ Great  is  the  Ch'ien's 
(It  is)  Truth’s  source  indeed  ! ” 


"Truthfulness* 1  [is]  the  holy2  man's  root." 

What  a deep  and  after  all  clear  and  true  idea  is  expressed  in 
these  simple  words  ! And  yet  Cheu-tsz’  ’s  treatise  will  be  disappoint- 
ing to  a Western  reader,  for  in  the  progress  of  his  exposition  our 
philosopher  interprets  virtue  in  terms  of  the  Yang  and  Yin  system. 
He  says  in  § 2 : 

origin.  All  things  thence  derive  their  beginning 

th’s  source  indeed  ! ” 

Ch'ien  is  the  first  combination  of  three  Yang  elements,  (=), 
and  stands  in  contrast  to  hji  Kw‘un  (=  =),  the  pure  combination  of 
three  Yin  elements  ; the  former  symbolises  “heaven,  virile  strength, 
manhood,  creative  power”;  the  latter,  “earth,  stability,  woman- 
hood, productiveness.”  This  is  one  striking  instance,  among  innu- 
merable others  that  can  be  found  in  Chinese  literature,  of  how  deeply 
even  the  most  powerful  minds,  with  the  sole  exception  of  Lao-tsz’, 
are  entangled  in  the  Yang  and  Yin  philosophy  that  looms  up  at  the 
mythical  beginning  of  Chinese  civilisation  and  still  rules  the  thought 
of  the  Celestial  Empire  to-day! 

CHU  HI’S  DOCTRINE  OF  LI  S AND  K’l  THE  IMMATERIAL 

PRINCIPLE  AND  PRIMARY  MATTER. 

The  mantle  of  Cheu-tsz’  fell  upon  Chu  Hi,  also  called  Chu 
Fu  Tsz’,  who  lived  1130-1200  A.  D.  In  his  exposition  of  the  clas- 


tare.  Dresden,  1876.  The  T'ai  Kih  T’u  is  the  first  chapter  of  the  Sing  li  tn  tseuen 
(literally,  "nature  principle  in  full  completeness, "or,  better,  "philosophical  encyclo- 
paedia") published  in  1415  by  the  third  sovereign  of  the  Ming  dynasty. 

1 

eke,  meaning  "thing,”  or  " substance  ” changes  its  preceding  word  into  a noun,  just 
as  does  the  English  word  ' ' one  ’’  in  such  clauses  as  ' ‘ the  true  one, ” ' ' this  one, ” or 
“ that  one.”  Accordingly  the  two  words  mean  " the  truth  essence,”  the  most  appro- 
priate translation  of  which  seems  to  be  "truthfulness." 

TO 

2 : | - slnng="  holy  ” or  " saint,”  shows  the  characters  "ear"  and  "to  in- 
form, "denoting  (as  Williams  has  it)  "one  who  on  hearing  knows  the  whole  case, . . . 
intuitively  wise  and  good,  . . . holy,  sacred,  perfect.” 


D/J)C  ch'ing="  truth,”  or  " truthful,”  consists  of  "word”and  "perfect.’’  "'gj 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


31 


sics  and  of  Cheu-tsz”s  works,  Chu  Hi1  leaves  no  doubt  about  the 
monism  of  his  philosophy.  His  works  were  published  at  the  re- 
quest of  Emperor  Kanghi  in  a collection  called  Cheu-tsz’  Tseueti  Shu 
(i.  e.,  the  complete  writings  of  Cheu-tsz’),  containing  among  other 
essays  his  treatise  on  The  Immaterial  Principle  (//)  and  Primary 
Matter  (W‘/),'2  the  first  sentence  of  which  reads,  according  to  Mr. 
Meadows’s  translation  (/.  /.  p.  373): 

“ In  the  whole  world  there  exists  no  primary  matter  (K’i),  devoid  of  the 

immaterial  principle  ; and  no  immaterial  principle  (li)  apart  from  primary  matter.’ 

Williams  in  his  Syllabic  Dictionary  of  the  Chinese  Language  ex- 
plains (on  p.  348)  as  follows  : 

" Fume  or  vapor  ; . . . steam  ; ether  ; the  aerial  fluid  ; breath,  air  ; vital  force; 

. . spirit,  temper,  feelings  ; a convenient  and  mobile  term  in  Chinese  philosophy 
for  explaining  and  denoting  whatever  is  supposed  to  be  the  source  or  primary  agent 
in  producing  or  modifying  motion.” 

Williams  adds  that  k‘i  is  more  material  than  li  (order)  and  tao 
(reason)  ; more  external  than  sin  j\\  (heart)  and  is  conditioned  by 
its  form  (Jiing).  It  is  opposed  to  chi  'Jif  (matter),3  “as  Zoor)  or 
spirit  is  opposed  to  the  body  it  animates.” 


1 See  Mayer's  Chinese  Reader's  Manual,  s.  v.,  Chu  Hi,  No.  79,  and  Chow  Tuni, 
No.  73;  Chinese  Repository,  Vol.  XIII  , pp.  552  et  seq.  and  609  etseq. ; also  Wil- 
liams, The  Middle  Kingdom,  I , 683  et  seq.  Compare  also  Mr.  Meadows’s  strictures 
on  Dr.  Medhurst's  translation,  /.  /.  pp.  372-374.  Mr.  Meadows’s  voluminous  book 
is  valuable  in  many  respects.  Having  served  as  an  interpreter  in  H.  M.  Civil  Ser- 
vice, he  knows  the  people  and  describes  the  conditions  with  great  impartiality. 
However  his  criticism  of  other  sinologists,  even  though  correct,  is  too  severe  He 
forgets  the  difficulties  under  which  they  labored  and  underrates  the  power  of  both 
religious  and  national  prejudice.  When  we  remember  how  greatly  the  nearest 
Western  nations,  such  as  the  Germans  and  French,  the  English  and  Americans 
misunderstand  one  another,  we  must  confess  that  the  misrepresentations  of  sinolo- 
gists are  quite  excusable. 

The  weakest  part  of  Mr.  Meadows’s  article  on  Chinese  philosophy  is  what  he  is 
pleased  to  call  "the  unfailing  pass-key  to  the  comprehension  of  all  difficult  passages 
in  the  Chinese  sacred  books,  as  understood  by  the  Chinese  themselves,”  which  con- 
sists in  the  proposition  that  the  differences  between  T'ai  kih  (ultimate  principle), 
fCi  (ether),  Tao  (Logos),  Li  (world-order),  Sin  (heart),  Sing  (nature),  teh  (virtue), 
t'ien  (heaven),  ming  (fate),  Ch'ing  (sincerity)  "are  purely  of  a nominal  kind.” 

2 " K’i  ” must  not  be  confounded  with  " Kih  " 

3 The  character  Js,  chih  shows  the  radical  “ property  " above  which  two  taels 
appear.  Thus  it  may  be  explained  as  "possessing  the  quality  of  weight.” 


32 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


Jj!j!  li  is  defined  by  the  same  authority  (on  p.  519)  as  : 

" The  governing  principle  ; that  which  is  felt  to  be  right  and  does  not  depend 
on  force  ; reason;  directing  principle  ; principle  of  organisation.  ” 

tt  sing, , “nature,”  signifies  the  subjective  disposition  of  things, 
never  the  objective  phenomena  of  the  universe.  The  word  sing  is 
composed  of  “heart”  and  “to  bear,  to  grow,”  denoting  that  which 
is  a manifestation  of  the  inner  character  of  existence. 

& sin,  “heart,”  means  not  only  the  physical  heart,  which  is 
regarded  as  the  lord  of  the  body  and  one  of  the  senses,  but  also  the 
core  of  things,  as  the  wick  of  a candle,  or  the  heart-wood  of  trees, 
and  the  ultimate  seat  of  desire,  the  origin  and  source  of  all  activit)\ 
Chu  Hi  (according  to  Dr.  Medhurst’s  translation)  continues  : 

“ When  the  primary  matter  is  not  collected  and  combined  in  form,  there  is  no 
lodging-place  for  the  immaterial  principle. 

“The  primary  matter  relies  on  the  immaterial  principle  to  come  into  action, 
and  wherever  the  primary  matter  is  coagulated  there  the  immaterial  principle  is 
present. 

“ No  priority  or  subsequence  can  be  predicated  of  the  immaterial  principle  and 
primary  matter,  and  yet  if  you  insist  on  carrying  out  the  reasoning  to  the  question 
of  their  origin,  then  you  must  say  that  the  immaterial  principle  has  the  priority; 
but  the  immaterial  principle  is  not  a separate  and  distinct  thing  ; it  is  just  contained 
within  the  primary  matter,  so  that  were  there  no  primary  matter,  then  this  imma- 
terial principle  would  have  no  place  of  attachment. 

“When  the  primary  matter  is  brought  into  being,  then  afterw-ards  the  imma- 
terial principle  has  some  place  whereon  to  rest.  In  regard  to  great  things  it  is  seen 
in  heaven  and  earth,  and  with  respect  to  small,  in  ants  and  emmets." 

While  dwelling  on  the  truth  that  the  immaterial  principle  is  in- 
separable from  primary  matter,  Chu  Hi  yet  recognises  the  higher 
dignity  and  priority  in  importance  of  the  former,  but  finding  no 
word  to  express  precedence  or  superiority  (i.  e.,  priority  in  rank)  to 
anteriority,  (i.  e.  priority  in  time),  he  says  : 

“.  . . And  it  appears  to  be  impossible  to  distinguish  the  priority  or  subsequence. 
If  you  insist  on  it,  the  immaterial  principle  is  first,  but  you  cannot  say,  to-day  the 
immaterial  principle  is  called  into  existence  and  to-morrow  primary  matter ; still 
there  is  a priority  and  a subsequence. 

‘ 1 Wherever  the  primary  matter  is  collected,  the  immaterial  principle  is  present ; 
but  after  all,  the  latter  must  be  considered  as  the  chief  ; this  is  what  is  called  the 
mysterious  junction.” 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


33 


Mr.  Meadows  translates  a passage  on  the  problem  of  the  prior- 
ity of  the  li  over  the  K‘i  as  follows  : 

" Being  asked  whether  the  immaterial  principle  or  primary  matter  first  existed 
he  (Cheu-tsz’)  said  : The  immaterial  principle  was  never  separated  from  primary 
matter ; but  the  immaterial  principle  is  what  is  previous  to  form,  while  primary 
matter  is  what  is  subsequent  to  form.” 

Chu  Hi  perceives  that  he  is  dealing  with  an  abstraction  of  the 
highest  kind,  an  abstraction  of  the  universal ; and  we  feel  in  the 
many  repetitions  which  fill  his  treatise  how  he  grapples  with  the 
problem,  the  solution  of  which  he  has  in  his  mind  without  being  able 
to  find  an  adequate  symbol  to  express  it.  Wherever  he  turns  he 
sees  inseparableness  and  distinctness.  The  immaterial  principle  is 
omnipresent  in  all  things,  and  yet  it  is  different  from  matter,  in  ex- 
planation of  which  Chu  Hi  says  : “ We  must  not  consider  the  mud- 
diness of  the  stream  to  be  the  water.” 

The  li  or  immaterial  principle,  resembles  Kant’s  a priori  or  the 
purely  formal,1  the  laws  of  which  remain  true  not  only  of  this  actual 
world  of  ours,  but  also  of  any  possible  world,  and  even  if  nothing 
at  all  existed.  Chu  Hi  attempts  to  express  his  idea  thus  : 

“You  cannot  distinguish  in  this  matter  between  existence  and  non-existence; 
before  heaven  and  earth  came  into  being  it  was  just  the  same.” 

The  immaterial  principle  remains  true  for  both  existence  and 
non-existence,  but  it  cannot  manifest  itself  without  the  existence  of 
primary  matter.  Seen  in  this  light,  the  last  quotation  will  not  ap- 
pear contradictory  to  the  following  : 

' ‘ Wherever  the  primary  matter  exists  there  is  found  the  immaterial  principle 
and  where  there  is  no  primary  matter  there  is  also  no  immaterial  principle.” 

The  immaterial  principle  is  the  natural  order  of  the  seasons, 
the  principle  of  virtue  in  the  moral  man,  the  wisdom  of  the  sage.  It 
is,  on  the  one  hand,  the  mentality  of  sentient  beings  which  makes 
comprehension  possible,  and  on  the  other  hand,  the  rationality  of 
the  universe,  i.  e.,  the  cosmic  order  which  renders  the  world  intel- 
ligible. Chu  Hi  says  : 


'It  is  what  we  define  in  the  Primer  of  Philosophy  (p.  79  et  seq.)  as  “ the  rigidly 
formal." 


34 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


“ That  which  perceives  is  the  immaterial  principle  of  the  mind  ; and  that  which 
enables  it  to  perceive  is  the  intelligence  of  the  primary  matter.” 

The  immaterial  principle  as  it  affects  the  Yang  and  Yin  is  sym- 
bolised by  a circle  in  which  light  and  darkness  are  evenly  divided. 
Darkness  contains  the  seed  of  light,  and  light  con- 
tains the  seed  of  darkness. 

Chu  Hi  identifies  the  immaterial  principle  with 
Lao-tsz”s  Tao  and  with  Cheu-tsz’ ’s  T‘ai  Kih. 

He  says  : 

“The  great  extreme  is  merely  the  immaterial  principle  of 
heaven,  earth,  and  all  things ; speaking  of  it  with  reference  to 
heaven  and  earth,  then  the  great  extreme  may  be  said  to  exist  within  heaven  and 
earth.  Speaking  of  it  with  respect  to  the  myriad  of  things,  then  amongst  the  myriad 
of  things 1 each  one  possesses  a great  extreme. 

‘ 1 The  great  extreme  is  not  an  independent  separate  existence  ; it  is  found  in  the 
male  and  female  principles  of  nature,  in  the  five  elements,  and  in  the  myriad 
of  things.  . . . Should  any  one  ask,  what  is  the  great  extreme  ? I should  say,  before 
its  development  it  is  the  immaterial  principle,  and  after  its  manifestation  it  is  feel- 
ing ; thus  for  instance,  when  it  moves  and  produces  the  male  principle  of  nature, 
then  it  is  feeling  or  passion. 

“At  the  very  first  there  was  nothing,  but  merely  this  immaterial  principle. 

“ From  the  time  when  the  great  extreme  came  into  operation  the  myriad  things 
were  produced  by  transformation  ; this  one  doctrine  includes  the  whole  ; it  is  not 
because  this  was  first  in  existence  and  then  that,  but  altogether  there  is  only  one 
great  origin,  which  from  the  substance  [abstract  existence ; in-itself-ness]  extends 
to  the  use  [to  its  manifestation  in  reality],  and  from  the  subtile  reaches  to  that 
which  is  manifest. 

“Cheu-tsz’  called  it  the  extremeless  or  the  illimitable,  by  which  he  meant  the 
great  noiseless,  scentless  mystery." 

By  “ noiseless  ” and  “scentless”  is  meant  the  incorporeal,  i.e., 
that  which  is  not  perceived  by  the  senses,  but  can  only  be  compre- 
hended by  the  mind — as,  for  instance,  the  truth  of  a mathematical 
theorem  cannot  be  apprehended  by  any  one  of  the  senses,  but  is  a 
matter  of  pure  understanding.  Thus  Chu  Hi  says : 

“ The  immaterial  principle  cannot  be  perceived  [viz.,  by  the  senses] ; but,  from 
the  operations  of  the  male  and  female  principles  of  nature  [viz.  the  purely  formal 


Symbol  of  the 
Source 
of  Existence. 


1 See  footnote  belonging  to  Fig.  12  on  p.  29. 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


35 


science  of  Yang  and  Yin  permutations]  we  become  acquainted  with  it  ; thus  the 
immaterial  principle  depends  (for  its  display)  on  the  male  and  female  principles  of 
nature. 

“Should  anyone  ask,  what  is  the  great  extreme  ? I would  say,  the  great  ex- 
treme is  simply  the  principle  of  extreme  goodness  and  extreme  perfection.  Every 
man  has  got  a great  extreme  ; every  thing  has  got  a great  extreme  ; that  which 
Cheu-tsz’  called  the  great  extreme  is  the  exemplified  virtue  of  everything  that  is 
extremely  good  and  extremely  perfect  in  heaven  and  earth,  men  and  things.” 

We  would  say,  “it  is  every  one’s  ideal,”  as  Riickert  expresses  it : 

"Vor  jedem  steht  ein  Bild  des,  das  er  werden  soil , 

Und  vor  er  es  nicht  ist,  i;t  nicht  sein  Friede  voll." 

[An  image  of  what  it  ought  to  be  lives  in  each  creature’s  mind 
So  long  as  that  is  unattained,  its  peace  it  cannot  find.] 

We  can  scarcely  appreciate  the  difficulties  which  Cheu-tsz’ and 
Chu  Hi  had  to  overcome  in  the  dualistic  terminology  of  their  na- 
tional tradition.  The  term  T‘ai  Kill  (Great  Extreme)  dates  back 
to  earlier  days,  but  the  monistic  conception  derived  from  its  appli- 
cation was  new;  and  it  was  a triumph  of  philosophical  thought 
which  their  inventors,  considering  the  circumstances  of  the  situa- 
tion, had  good  reasons  to  prize  highly.  Chu  Hi  says  : 

“The  great  extreme  is  the  immaterial  principle  of  the  two  powers,  the  four 
forms,  and  the  eight  changes  of  nature  ; we  cannot  say  that  it  does  not  exist,  and 
yet  there  is  no  form  or  corporeity  that  can  be  ascribed  to  it.  From  this  point  is 
produced  the  one  male  and  the  one  female  principle  of  nature,  which  are  called 
the  two  powers  ; also  the  four  forms  and  the  eight  changes  proceed  from  this,  all 
according  to  a certain  natural  order,  irrespective  of  human  strength  in  its  arrange- 
ment. But  from  the  time  of  Confucius  no  one  has  been  able  to  get  hold  of  this 
idea.  Until  the  time  of  Shau  Kangtsie,  when  this  doctrine  was  explained,  and  it 
appeared  very  reasonable  and  pleasing.  It  may  not  therefore  be  treated  with  light- 
ness, and  should  be  more  particularly  inquired  into.® 

In  a word,  the  monistic  school  of  Cheu-tsz’  and  Chu  Hi  are 
in  the  history  of  Chinese  thought  what  Kant  is  in  the  Western 
world.  They  discovered  that  the  Yang  and  Yin  manipulations  are 
what  we  would  call  the  most  abstract  algebra  of  thought  or  the  sci- 
ence of  pure  forms,  embodying  the  universal  and  necessary  laws  of 
both  the  objective  realm  of  existence  and  the  subjective  realm  of 
man’s  mentality. 


3& 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


FILIAL  PIETY 


European  and  American  civilisation  has  less  firm  foundations 
in  us  as  compared  with  the  deep  root  which  the  Chinese  view  of 
life  has  struck  in  the  souls  of  Chinamen.  It  is  reflected  in  their 
thought,1  in  institutions,  in  the  habits  of  their  daily  life,  in  their 
symbolism,  in  their  language,  and  above  all  in  their  ethics  which 
reflects  their  views  of  the  relation  of  Yang  to  Yin,  being  in  its  noblest 
conception  the  completest  submission  of  a child  to  the  will  of  his 
father,  a virtue  which  is  called  in  Chinese  Hiao ,2 3 

As  an  instance  of  the  influence  of  the  Yang  and  Yin  philosophy 
upon  the  life  of  all  nations  that  have  ever  felt  the  influence  of  the 
Chinese  world-view,  we  state  that  the  name  of  the  greatest  Japanese 
monthly  is  “The  Great  Yang”;  which  is  translated  by  the  editors 
by  “The  Sun.”  The  flag  of  the  Coreans  shows  the  diagram  of  the 
symbol  of  the  primordial  source  of  existence  (as  it  appears  in  Fig.  13) 
in  blue  and  red  colors,  surrounded  by  the  trigrams  Ch'ien,  Kan,  Li, 

The  most  important  field  in  which  the  Yang  and  Yin  philosophy 
exercises  its  influence  is  in  the  domain  of  ethics.  The  dualism  that 
still  lingers  in  Chinese  thought  finds  its  expression  in  the  Chinese 
code  of  morals  which  always  implies  an  external  relation  between 
two,  an  authoritative  master  and  an  obedient  servant,  the  duty  of 
the  former  being  wisdom  in  government,  and  of  the  latter  submis- 
sion. One  of  the  favorite  treatises  of  Chinese  literature,  the  booklet 
entitled  The  Classic  of  Filial  Piety?  sets  forth  the  idea  that  “filial 

1 The  Yih  with  its  Yang  and  Yin  is  part  and  parcel  of  the  mind  of  every  edu- 
cated Chinaman.  Even  Lao-Tsz’,  the  greatest  adversary  of  Confucian  scholar- 
ship, says:  “The  ten  thousand  things  are  sustained  by  the  Yin  and  encompassed  by 
the  Yang;  and  the  K'i  (the  immaterial  breath)  renders  them  harmonious.”  (Ch.42.) 

As  a thoroughly  reliable  description  of  Chinese  life  we  recommend  Prof.  Rob- 
ert K.  Douglas's  works,  Chinese  Stories,  W.  Blackwood  & Sons,  Edinburgh,  1893, 
and  Society  in  China,  A.  D.  Innes  & Co.,  London,  1894. 


2The  character  Hiao,  -j— , filial  piety,  shows  a child  supporting  an  old  man. 

3 Sacred  Boohs  of  the  East,  Vol.  III.,  pp.  447-448.  The  book  was  written  either 
by  Tsang-tsz’,  the  disciple  of  Confucius,  or  by  one  of  Tsang-tsz’  's  school. 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


37 


devotion  is  the  root  of  virtue.”  Filial  devotion  is  said  to  be  “the 
maxim  of  Heaven,  the  righteousness  of  Earth,  and  the  duty  of  man” 

The  idea  of  filial  piety  is  widened  into  devotion  as  it  applies  to 
the  five  moral  relations  that  obtain  between  man  and  man  ; viz., 
between  (i)  sovereign  and  subject,  (2)  parent  and  child,  (3)  elder 
brother  and  younger,  (4)  husband  and  wife,  (5)  friend  and  friend.1 

When  asked  by  Tsang  whether  in  the  virtue  of  the  sages  there 
was  not  something  higher,  Confucius  replied  : 

“ Of  all  (creatures  with  their  different)  natures  produced  by  Heaven  and  Earth 
man  is  the  noblest.  Of  all  the  actions  of  man  there  is  none  greater  than  filial  piety. 
In  filial  piety  there  is  nothing  greater  than  the  reverential  awe  of  one’s  father.  In 
the  reverential  awe  shown  to  one’s  father  there  is  nothing  greater  than  the  making 
him  the  correlate  of  Heaven.” 

The  higher  monistic  ethics,  which  becomes  possible  only  on 
an  advanced  plane  in  the  evolution  of  mankind,  unites  both  the 
governor  and  the  governed  in  one  person  and  expects  every  one  to 
be  his  own  king,  priest,  and  instructor,  replacing  the  external  rela- 
tion by  an  internal  relation.  This  principle  of  a monistic  ethics  was 
first  proclaimed  in  the  history  of  European  civilisation  by  the  re- 
formers of  the  sixteenth  century,  who  taught  self-dependence  and 
claimed  the  liberty  of  conscience.  Liberty  of  conscience,  self-re- 
liance, the  right  of  free  inquiry  and  free  thought  abolish  personal 
authority,  not  for  the  sake  of  anarchy,  but  to  replace  it  by  the  su- 
perpersonal authority  of  justice,  right,  and  truth. 

Filial  devotion  remains  submission,  as  we  read  in  Chapter  XI  : 

" When  constraint  is  put  upon  a ruler,  that  is  the  disowning  of  his  superiority; 
when  the  authority  of  the  sages  is  disallowed,  that  is  the  disowning  of  (all)  law ; 
when  filial  piety  is  put  aside,  that  is  the  disowning  of  the  principle  of  affection. 
These  (three  things)  pave  the  way  to  anarchy.” 

Rebels  are  punished  with  brutal  severity,  yet  there  are  frequent 
revolutions  in  China ; and  the  Shu  King  goes  so  far  even  as  to  sanc- 
tion them,  provided  they  be  successful.  We  read  : 


JThe  fivefold  relationship  which  constitutes  the  substance  of  Chinese  ethics  is 
supplemented  by  K'ung  Ki’s  principle  that  good  is  the  middle  way  between  two  ex- 
tremes— a doctrine,  which  by  Western  critics  has  been  censured  as  “ the  ethics  of 
mediocrity.”  K'ung  Ki  was  a grandson  of  Confucius. 


3» 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


“ Heaven  establishes  sovereigns  merely  for  the  sake  of  the  people  ; whom  the 
people  desire  for  sovereign,  him  will  Heaven  protect  ; whom  the  people  dislike  as 
sovereign,  him  will  Heaven  reject. 

“[The  Sovereign's]  real  way  of  serving  Heaven  is  to  love  the  people. 

“ When  he  fails  to  love  the  people  Heaven  will,  for  the  sake  of  the  people,  cast 
him  out.” 

Thus  revolutions  are  regarded  as  ordeals  in  which  success  or 
failure  signify  the  decision  of  heaven. 

How  the  spirit  of  devotion  is  carried  to  the  extreme,  can  be 
illustrated  by  many  instances  of  Chinese  habits,  history,  and  stories. 
We  quote  one  tale,  which  is  at  once  typical  and  terse,  from  a pop- 
ular book  called  The  Twenty-four  Filials  :x 

“ In  the  days  of  the  Han  dynasty  lived  Koh  Kii,  who  was  very  poor.  He  had 
one  child  three  years  old  ; and  such  was  his  poverty  that  his  mother  usually  divided 
her  portion  of  food  with  this  little  one.  Koh  says  to  his  wife,  ' We  are  so  poor  that 
our  mother  cannot  be  supported,  for  the  child  divides  with  her  the  portion  of  food 
that  belongs  to  her.  Why  not  bury  this  child  ? Another  child  may  be  born  to  us 
but  a mother  once  gone  will  never  return.’  His  wife  did  not  venture  to  object  to 
the  proposal ; and  Koh  immediately  dug  a hole  of  about  three  cubits  deep,  when 
suddenly  he  lighted  upon  a pot  of  gold,  and  on  the  metal  read  the  following  inscrip- 
tion : ‘ Heaven  bestows  this  treasure  upon  Koh  Fu,  the  dutiful  son  ; the  magistrate 
may  not  seize  it,  nor  shall  the  neighbors  take  it  from  him.’  ”2 

The  neglect  of  what  Western  nations  would  consider  as  the 
highest  duties  is  frequently  enjoined  for  the  sake  of  parents;  and  in 
agreement  with  this  code  of  morals,  the  Chinese  Emperor  of  late 
concluded  to  yield  to  all  the  demands  of  the  victorious  Japanese 
only  that  the  Empress  dowager  in  Pekin  should  not  be  obliged  to 
be  inconvenienced  by  a removal  of  the  Imperial  Court. 

While  on  this  important  point  our  Western  ideas  of  morality 
are  different  from  those  of  the  Chinese,  we  ought  to  consider  that 
our  American  youths  go  to  the  other  extreme.  They  can  still  learn 
from  the  Chinese,  whose  devotion  to  old  parents  is  sometimes  truly 
elevating  and  touching  ; and  we  have  to  add  that  one  of  the  chief 
obstacles,  although  not  the  only  one,  to  the  introduction  of  Chris- 
tianity into  China  are  such  words  of  Christ’s  as  these  : 


2 Quoted  from  Williams's  Middle  Kingdom,  Vol.  I , p.  539. 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


39 


' If  any  man  come  to  me,  and  hate  not  his  father,  and  mother,  and  wife,  and 
children,  and  brethren,  and  sisters,  yea,  and  his  own  life  also,  he  cannot  be  my  dis- 
ciple."— Luke,  xiv,  26. 

‘ ‘ I am  come  to  set  a man  at  variance  against  his  father,  and  the  daughter 
against  her  mother,  and  the  daughter-in-law  against  her  mother-in-law." — Matth., 
x,  35- 

The  dualism  of  Chinese  ethics  finds  expression  in  a rigid  code 
of  ceremonial  forms.  Who  ever  met  an  educated  Chinese  gentle- 
man and  was  not  struck  by  his  extraordinary  and  almost  painfully 
polite  demeanor?  How  much  stress  is  laid  upon  details  in  propriety, 
we  can  gather  from  the  following  injunction  of  courtesy  toward  visi- 
tors as  quoted  by  Williams,  in  his  Middle  Kingdom,  Vol.  I.,  p.  540, 
from  Chu  Hi’s  “Juvenile  Instructor”  (Siao  Hioli)  : 

‘ ‘ Whoever  enters  with  his  guests,  yields  precedence  to  them  at  every  door  ; 
when  they  reach  the  innermost  one,  he  begs  leave  to  go  in  and  arrange  the  seats, 
and  then  returns  to  receive  the  guests  ; and  after  they  have  repeatedly  declined  he 
bows  to  them  and  enters.  He  passes  through  the  right  door,  they  through  the  left. 
He  ascends  the  eastern,  they  the  western  steps. 

" If  a guest  be  of  a lower  grade,  he  must  approach  the  steps  of  the  host,  while 
the  latter  must  repeatedly  decline  this  attention  ; then  the  guest  may  return  to  the 
western  steps,  he  ascending,  both  host  and  guest  must  mutually  yield  precedence  : 
then  the  host  must  ascend  first,  and  the  guests  follow.  From  step  to  step  they 
must  bring  their  feet  together,  gradually  ascending — those  on  the  east  moving  the 
right  foot  first,  those  on  the  west  the  left.” 

n 

THE  SIGNIFICANCE  OF  THE  YIH. 

We  ask  now,  what  is  the  original  significance  of  the  Yih  King, 
and,  without  attempting  to  decide  the  problem,  present  some  solu- 
tions which  have  been  proposed  by  various  scholars. 

The  oldest  European  interpretation  of  the  Kwa  comes  from 
the  pen  of  no  less  an  authority  than  the  great  Leibnitz.  On  ex- 
plaining, in  the  Me??ioires  de  /’ Academie  Royale  des  sciences  (1703,  III., 
p.  85),  the  nature  and  advantage  of  the  binary  or  dyadic  system  of 
numeration,  which  employs  only  the  symbols  o and  1,  expressing  2 
by  10,  3 by  11,  4 by  100,  5 by  101,  6 by  no,  7 by  in,  etc.,  he  makes 
reference  to  the  Kwa  of  the  Yih  King,  which  he  calls  “cova.”1  He 
says : 


1 ‘ ‘ Cova  ” is  the  same  as  1 ‘ coua,”  “ v ” being  equal  to  “ u.  ” 


4° 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


‘ ' Ce  qu'il  y a de  surprenant  dans  ce  calcul,  c'est  que  cette  arithmetique  par  o et 
i se  trouve  contenir  le  mystere  des  lignes  d'un  ancient  roi  et  philosophe  nomme 
Fohy,  qu'on  croit  avoir  vecu  il  y a plus  de  quatre  mille  ans,  et  que  les  Chinois  re- 
gardent  comme  le  fondateur  de  leur  empire  et  de  leurs  sciences.  II  y a plusieurs 
figures  lineaires  qu’on  lui  attribue.  Elies  reviennent  toutes  a cette  arithmetique, 
mais  il  suffit  de  mettre  ici  la  figure  de  huit  Cova  comme  on  l’appelle,  qui  passe 
pour  fondamentale,  et  d’y  joindre  l'explication,  qui  est  manifeste,  pourvu  qu'on  re- 
marque  premierement  qu'une  ligne  entiere  — — signifie  l’unite  ou  i,  et  seconde- 
ment  qu'une  ligne  brisee  — _ signifie  le  zero  ou  o. 


o 

o 

o 


o 


o 


o 

o 


I 


I 


o 

o 


IOO 


4 


1 1 1 


6 7 


“Les  Chinois  ont  perdu  la  signification  des  Cova  ou  lineations  de  Fohy,  peut 
etre  depuis  plus  d'un  millenaire  d’annees  ; et  ils  ont  fait  des  commentaires  la- 
dessus,  ou  ils  ont  cherche  je  ne  sais  quels  sens  eloignes.  De  sorte  qu’il  a fallu  que 
la  vraie  explication  leur  vint  maintenant  des  Europeens.  Voici  comment.  Il  n’y 
a guere  plus  de  deux  ans  que  j’envoyai  au  R.  P.  Bouvet,  Jesuite  framjais  celebre, 
qui  demeure  a Pekin,  ma  maniere  de  compter  par  o et  i,  et  il  n’en  fallut  pas 
d’avantage  pour  le  faire  reconnaitre  que  c’est  la  clef  de  figures  de  Fohy.  Ainsi 
m’ecrivant  le  14.  Novembre,  il  m’a  envoye  la  grande  figure  de  ce  prince  philosophe 
qui  va  a 64,  et  ne  laisse  plus  lieu  de  douter  de  la  verite  de  notre  interpretation,  de 
sorte  qu’on  peut  dire  que  ce  Pere  a dechiffre  l’enigme  de  Fohy  a 1’aide  de  ce  que  je 
lui  avais  communique.  Et  comme  ces  figures  sont  peut-etre  le  plus  ancient  monu- 
ment de  science  qui  soit  au  monde,  cette  restitution  de  leur  sens,  apres  un  si  grand 
intervalle  de  temps,  paraitra  d’autant  de  plus  curieuse. 

“ Le  consentement  des  figures  de  Fohy  et  de  ma  Table  des  Nombres  se  fait 
mieux  voire  lorsque  dans  la  table  on  supplee  les  zeros  initiaux,  qui  paraissent 
superflus,  mais  qui  servent  a mieux  marquer  la  periode  de  la  colonne,  comme  je  les 
y ai  supplees  en  effet  avec  des  petits  ronds  pour  les  distinguer  des  zeros,  et  cet  ac- 
cord me  donne  une  grande  opinion  de  la  profondeur  des  meditations  de  Fohy.  Car 
ce  qui  nous  parait  aise  maintenant,  ne  l’etait  pas  dans  ce  temps  eloigne. 

“L’arithmetique  binaire  ou  dyadique  est  en  effet  fort  aise  aujourd’hui  pour  peu 
qu’on  y pense,  par  ce  que  notre  maniere  de  compter  y aide  beaucoup,  dont  il 
semble  qu’on  retranche  seulement  le  trop.  Mais  cette  arithmetique  ordinaire  par 
dix  ne  parait  pas  fort  ancienne,  au  moins  les  Grecs  et  les  Romains  l’ont  ignoree,  et 
ont  ete  prives  de  ses  avantages.  Il  semble  que  l’Europe  en  doit  l’introduction  a 
Gerbert,  depuis  Pape  sous  le  nom  de  Sylvestre  II,  qui  l’a  eu  des  Maures  d’Espagne. 

“ Or  comme  l’on  croit  a la  Chine  que  Fohy  est  encore  auteur  des  caracteres  Chi- 
nois ordinaires,  quoique  fort  alteres  par  la  suite  des  temps  : son  essay  d’arithmd- 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


41 


0 

0 

0 

0 

0 

0 

1 = 0 

0 

0 

0 

0 

0 

I 

= I 

0 

0 

0 

0 

I 1 0 

= 2 

0 

0 

0 

0 

I 

! I 

= 3 

0 

0 

0 

I 

0 

0 

= 4 

0 

0 

0 

I 

0 

I 

= 5 

0 

0 

0 

I 

I 

0 

= 6 

0 

0 

0 

I 

1 I 

I 

= 7 

0 

0 

I 

0 

I 0 

0 

= 8 

0 

0 

I 

0 

i 0 

I 

= 9 

0 

0 

I 

0 

I 

0 

= 10 

0 

0 

I 

0 

I 

I 

= 11 

0 

0 

I 

I 

0 

0 

= 12 

0 

0 

I 

I 

0 

I 

=13 

0 

0 

I 

I 

I 

0 

=14 

0 

0 

I 

I 

I 

I 

=15 

0 

I 

0 

0 

0 

0 

= 16 

0 

I 

0 

0 

0 

I 

=17 

0 

I 

0 

0 

I 

0 

=18 

0 

I 

0 

0 

I 

I 

=19 

0 

I 

0 

I 

0 

0 

= 20 

0 

I 

0 

I 

0 

I 

= 21 

0 

I 

0 

I 

I 

0 

= 22 

0 

I 

0 

I 

I 

I 

=23 

0 

I 

I 

0 

0 

0 

=24 

0 

I 

I 

0 

0 

I 

=25 

0 

I 

I 

0 

I 

0 

=26 

0 

I 

I 

0 

I 

I 

=27 

0 

I 

I 

I 

0 

0 

=28 

0 

I 

I 

I 

0 

I 

=29 

0 

I 

I 

I 

I 

0 

=30 

0 

I 

I 

I 

I 

I 

=31 

1 

0 

0 

0 

0 

0 

=32 

I 

0 

0 

0 

0 

I 

=33 

I 

0 

0 

0 

I 

0 

=34 

I 

0 

0 

0 

' I 

I 

=35 

1 

0 

0 

I 

0 

0 

=36 

I 

0 

0 

I 

0 i 

I 

=37 

I 

0 

0 

I 

I 1 

0 

=38 

1 

0 

0 

I 

I 

I 

= 39 

I 

0 

I 

0 

0 l 

0 

=40 

I 

0 1 

I 

0 

0 

I 

=41 

I 

0 1 

I 

0 

I 

0 

=42 

I 

0 

I 

0 

I 

I 

=43 

I 

0 

I 

I 

0 1 

0 

=44 

I 

0 

I 

I 

0 

I 

= 45 

1 

0 I 

I 

I 

I 

0 

=46 

I 

O 1 

I 

I 

I 

I 

=47 

1 

I 

0 

0 

0 

0 

=48 

1 

I 1 

0 

0 

0 i 

T 

=49 

I 

I 1 

0 

0 1 

I 

0 

=50 

I 

I 1 

0 

0 1 

I 

I 

=51 

I 

I 1 

0 

1 1 

0 1 

0 

=52 

I 

I 1 

0 

I 1 

0 1 

I 

= 53 

I 

I 1 

0 

I 1 

I 

0 

= 54 

I 

I 1 

0 

I 1 

I i 

I 

= 55 

I 

I 1 

I 

0 1 

0 

0 

=56 

I 

I 1 

I 

0 1 

0 

I 

=57 

I 

I 1 

I 1 

0 1 

I 1 

0 

=58 

I 

I 1 

I 1 

0 

I 

I 

= 59 

I 

I 1 

I 

I 1 

0 1 

0 

=60 

I 

I 

I 1 

i ! 

0 

I 

=61 

I 

I 1 

I 1 

I 1 

I ; 

0 

=62 

I 

I 1 

I 1 

I 1 

I 1 

I 1 

=63 

Binary  System  of  Leibnitz.  Evolution  of  the  Kwa,  or  the  Kwa  Evolved 

from  T“ai  Kih. 

It  will  be  of  interest  to  compare  Leibnitz’s  binary  numbers  with  Cheu-tsz’ ’s  design ; the 
similarity  among  which  will  appear  as  soon  as  o is  identified  with  the  black  and  1 with  the 
white  l l spaces. 


42 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


tique  fait  juger  qu'il  pourrait  s’y  trouver  quelque  chose  de  considerable  par  rapport 
aux  nombres  et  aux  idees,  si  1’on  pouvait  deterrer  le  fondement  de  lecriture  Chi- 
noise,  d’autant  plusqu’on  croit  a la  Chine,  qu'il  a eu  egard  aux  nombres  en 
l’etablissant.  Le  R.  P.  Bouvet  est  fort  porte  a pousser  cette  pointe,  et  tres  capable 
d'y  reussir  en  bien  de  manieres.  Cependant  je  ne  sais  s’il  y a jamais  eu  dans  lecri- 
ture  Chinoise  un  avantage  rapprochant  de  celui  qui  doit  etre  dans  une  caracteris- 
tique  que  je  projette.  C'est  que  tout  raisonnement  qu’on  peut  tirer  des  notions, 
pourrait  etre  tire  de  leurs  caracteres  par  une  maniere  de  calcul,  qui  serait  une  des 
plus  importans  moyens  d'aides  de  l'esprit  humain.” 

Prof.  Moritz  Cantor,1  disposes  of  Leibnitz’s  interpretation  of 
the  Kwa  because  “Mr.  Duhalde  had  proved  them  to  be  projective 
drawings  of  the  knotted  cords.”  He  adds  that  they  must,  accord- 
ing to  Bouvet,  be  regarded,  on  account  of  their  names,  not  as  num- 
bers, but  as  physical  symbols,  and  explains  Leibnitz’s  theory  as 
exclusively  due  to  his  philosophical  interpretation  of  the  binary  sys- 
tem, which  was  to  him  an  evidence  in  favor  of  his  conception  of  a 
creation  from  nothing  or  zero  with  the  sole  assistance  of  One  or  the 
unit.  But  Cantor  seems  to  overlook  that  in  this  very  respect  the 
ancient  Yang  and  Yin  philosophy  of  the  Chinese  closely  resembles 
Leibnitz’s  idea,  whether  we  regard  the  Kwa  as  numbers,  or  as  a 
binary  system  of  such  symbols  as  are  still  more  general  and  indefi- 
nite. The  fact  of  both  their  presence  and  their  philosophical  sig- 
nificance remains  the  same  and  cannot  be  doubted. 

The  first  translation  of  the  Yih  is  in  Latin.  It  was  made 
by  the  Jesuit  P.  Regis  with  the  assistance  of  some  of  his  colleagues, 
and  edited  in  two  volumes  by  Julius  Mohl.2 

Prof.  James  Legge’s  translation  is  based  upon  the  idea  that  the 
book  in  its  main  parts  and  originally  was  intended  to  be  a kind  of 
political  testament  of  King  Wen  and  the  Duke  of  Cheu,  enlarging  on 
moral  and  social  questions,  but  enigmatically  written  after  the  man- 
ner and  fashion  of  diviners.  He  therefore  tries  to  bring  his  mind 
en  rapport  with  the  mind  of  its  authors  and  paraphrases  the  mean- 
ing of  the  disconnected  words  and  sentences  in  the  sense  that  he 


'In  his  Malhematische  Beitrdge  zum  Kulturleben  iter  Volker,  Halle,  1863,  p.  49. 

2 Y King,  Antiquitissimus  Sinarum  liber,  quern  ex  latina  interpretatione  P.  Regis 
aliorumque  ex  Soc.  Jesu  P.  T , edidit  Julius  Mohl.  Stuttgartise  et  Tiibingae.  1834. 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


43 


finds  indicated  in  the  text.  He  encloses  his  additions  in  parentheses, 
saying  : 

"I  hope,  however,  that  I have  been  able  in  this  way  to  make  the  translation 
intelligible  to  readers.  If,  after  all,  they  shall  conclude  that  in  what  is  said  on  the 
hexagrams  there  is  often  'much  ado  about  nothing,’  it  is  not  the  translator  who 
should  be  deemed  accountable  for  that,  but  his  original.” 

A peculiar  conception  of  the  Yih  King  has  been  propounded  by 
P.  L.  F.  Philastre,  who  lays  much  stress  on  the  tradition  that  Fuh- 
Hi  received  his  first  idea  of  the  Kwa  by  contemplating  the  starry 
heavens  and  believes  that  he  discovered  in  the  Kwa  combinations  a 
method  of  symbolising  the  astronomical  lore  of  the  ancient  Chinese. 
His  lucubration  embodies  translations  of  the  most  important  Chi- 
nese commentaries.1 

Canon  McClatchie  published  a translation  of  the  Yih  King  in 
which  he  ventures  to  open  its  mysteries  “ by  applying  the  key  of 
comparative  mythology.”  I have  not  seen  it  and  quote  only  what 
Professor  Legge  has  to  say  about  it  ( Sacred  Books  of  the  East,  Vol. 
XVI,  p.  xvii)  : 

“Such  a key  was  not  necessary  and  the  author  by  the  application  of  it,  has 
found  sundry  things  to  which  I have  occasionally  referred  in  my  notes.  They  are 
not  pleasant  to  look  at  or  dwell  upon,  and  happily  it  has  never  entered  into  the 
minds  of  Chinese  scholars  to  conceive  them.” 

A.  Terrien  de  Lacouperie2  believes  that  the  Yih  King  is  a mere 
vocabulary  containing  those  word-symbols  which  the  Bak  families 
brought  with  them  as  a sacred  inheritance  of  the  Elamo-Babylonian 
civilisation. 

P.  Angelo  Zottoli  says  of  the  Yih  King  in  his  Cursus  Literatnrae 
Sinicae  : 

“A.  Terrien  de  Lacouperie  believes  that  the  old  Chinese  civilisation  is  an  off- 
shoot of  the  Elamo-Babylonian  civilisation  in  the  very  stage  of  development  that 
had  been  reached  a little  after  the  middle  of  the  third  millennium  B.  C.,  and  claims 
that  the  hexagrams  are  the  script  which  the  Bak  tribes,  the  oldest  civilisers  of 
China,  carried  with  them  to  the  new  homes,  and  the  Yih  King  is  originally  a diction- 
ary of  the  ancient  word-symbols  with  their  lexicographical  explanations,  the  mean- 

1 Annates  du  Musee  Guimet , Vols.  VIII.  and  XXIII. 

2 The  Oldest  Book  of  the  Chinese , the  Yi  King  and  Its  Authors.  London  : D. 
Nutt,  270  Strand,  1892. 


44 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


ing  of  which  was  later  on  misunderstood  without  losing  the  awe  that  naturally  was 
attached  to  the  book  as  embodying  the  wisdom  of  the  sages  of  yore.” 

“ The  book  consists  of  the  figures  of  Fuh  Hi,  of  the  divinations  of  King  Wen, 
of  the  symbols  of  the  Duke  of  Cheu,  and  the  commentaries  of  Confucius.  From 
the  permutations  which  the  two  elements  in  the  composition  of  the  hexagrams  un- 
dergo it  is  called  Yih  (the  permutator),  or  Yih  King,  the  Book  of  Permutations.  What, 
then,  is  this  famous  Yih  King  ? It  is,  briefly,  this.  From  the  continuous  or  bisected 
quality  of  the  lines,  their  position  either  at  the  bottom  or  in  the  middle  or  topmost, 
their  mutual  relation  as  being  opposed  and  separated,  or  coming  together,  the  body 
or  form  of  the  trigrams  themselves  ; further,  from  the  symbol  or  image  of  the  tri- 
grams, from  the  quality  or  virtue  of  the  trigrams,  sometimes  from  the  difference  of 
one  hexagram  as  compared  to  another,  a certain  picture  is  developed  and  a certain 
idea  is  deduced  containing  something  like  an  oracle  that  can  be  consulted  by  drawing 
lots,  in  order  to  obtain  some  warning  fit  for  guidance  in  life  or  to  solve  some  doubt. 
Such  is  the  book  according  to  the  explanations  of  Confucius  as  handed  down  in  the 
schools.  Therefore,  you  must  expect  neither  anything  sublime  or  mysterious,  nor 
anything  unseemly  or  vile.  I see  in  it  rather  a subtle  play  for  eliciting  moral  and  po- 
litical instructions,  such  as  can  be  found  in  the  Chinese  classics,  obtrusive,  plain,  and 
natural.  Since  this  book,  as  a reader  of  the  original  text  will  understand,  has  been 
employed  for  fortune  telling,  one  expects  to  gain  by  it  the  highest  happiness  of  life, 
mysterious  communication  with  spirits  and  occult  knowledge  of  future  events. 
Therefore,  the  book  appears  as  a magic  revelation,  as  a perfect  light,  as  throughout 
spiritual  and  conformable  to  the  life  of  man.  Hence  the  praises  attributed  to  it  by 
Confucius,  although  quite  exaggerated,  will  be  seen  specially  added  in  the  Appendix 
of  the  book,  if  it  is  true  at  all  as  the  common  opinion  goes,  that  he  himself  is  the 
author  of  the  Appendix.’’1 

Ch.  de  Harlez,  the  originator  of  the  idea  that  the  nature  of  the 
Yih  King  is  lexicological,  does  not  accept  Lacouperie’s  theory  of  an 
Elamo-Babylonian  origin  of  the  Yih  King.  He  says  in  the  preface 
to  his  French  translation  of  the  Yih2 : 

1 ' Notre  systeme  . . . nous  fait  voir  dans  le  Yih  un  reccueil  mi-lexicologique, 
mi-philosophique  de  termes  et  de  sentences,  plein  de  raison  et  de  sagesse.”— P.  n. 

There  remains  one  more  hypothesis  on  the  nature  of  the  Yih 
King  which  is  by  Dr.  Heinrich  Riedel,  of  Brooklyn,  N.  Y.  He  has 
given  me  much  assistance  in  my  own  Chinese  studies  and  I am  in- 
clined to  believe  that  he  has  something  to  say  on  the  subject  that  is 


1 Translated  from  the  Latin.  The  original  is  quoted  by  Legge  in  his  Preface  to 
the  Yih  King,  p.  xviii. 

2 Published  in  1889  by  F.  Hayer,  Bruxelles,  rue  de  Louvain,  108. 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


45 


worth  hearing.  Since  his  observations  have  never  been  published, 
I deem  it  advisable,  for  the  sake  of  sinology,  to  present  some  chips 
from  his  workshop. 

Dr.  Riedel  regards  the  Yih  as  a calendar  of  the  lunar  year,  being 
what  the  title  of  Cheu-tsz’  ’s  book  on  the  Yih  indicated,  a T‘ung  Shu, 
“ a universal  book,”  or  “ almanac,”  embodying  everything  in  the  do- 
main of  science,  religion,  ethics,  and  even  sport  that  appeared  of  in- 
terest. T‘ung Shu  means  “calendar,”  and  6 X 64  = 384  (the  number 
of  strokes  in  the  hexagrams)  is  the  number  of  days  of  the  intercalary 
year.  As  to  the  hexagrams,  Dr.  Riedel  insists  that  “ the  specific 
order  of  the  sixty-four  hexagrams  which  is  carefully  preserved  and 
sacredly  guarded  by  devices  that  remind  us  of  the  Massoretic  pre- 
cautions taken  in  regard  to  the  Hebrew  texts  of  the  Bible  and  which 
has  }Tet  received  little  if  any  attention,  is  the  soul  and  substance  of 
the  Yih  King,”  and  trusts  to  be  able  to  prove  that  the  circular  de- 
vice of  hexagrams  including  the  square  represents  “the  problem  of 
squaring  the  circle.”  Here  are,  in  a condensed  form,  some  points 
of  his  theory : 

There  is  in  Chinese  authors  a frequent  substitution  of  symbols 
by  homonyms;  as  Gabelentz  says:  “The  ancient  authors  either 
through  mistake  or  in  emergency,  or  by  sheer  whim,  used  to  replace 
the  character  of  a word  by  another  one  which  probably  in  their  age 
had  the  same  or  a very  similar  sound.”  ( Gr . Ch.  Gr.  p.  100.)  And 
this  must  be  expected  to  have  taken  place  in  the  Yih  King  rather 
more  freefy  than  in  other  books.  Now  take  the  first  sentence  of  the 
Yih  King  and  replace  it  by  homonyms  as  follows  : 


fi  *1  £ 


Both  lines  read  nearly  alike  : “Krien  yuen  hang  li  ching  ; ” but 
the  former  means  “ K'ien,  origin  (and)  progress  determined  by  ad- 
vantageousness,” while  the  latter  means  “See  the  circle’s  path  rec- 
tified by  reason.  ” 

The  aphorism  belonging  to  the  first  (viz.  the  lowest)  Kiu  line 
of  the  first  Kwa,  which  reads  “Ts‘ien  lung  wuh  yung,”  Dr.  Riedel 


46 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


translates  : “A  hidden  dragon  through  negation  is  action,”  which  is 
meant  to  set  forth  the  mathematical  and  logical  powers  of  naught  (o). 

Legge  is  unable  to  bring  sense  into  a passage  in  which  robbery 
is  declared  to  teach  ethics  ( Sacred  Books  of  the  East , III.,  p.  203, 
§ 48).  The  paragraph,  however,  becomes  clear  when  we  adopt  Dr. 
Riedel’s  proposition  to  regard  robbery  as  a game  like  chess  and 
translate  it  by  “latrunculi”  or  robbery-game.  Burden-bearers,  i.e. 
peasants  or  laborers,  should  be  translated  by  “pawns.”  Other 
allusions  that  occur  in  the  passage,  such  as  “false  moves,”  “leaving 
exposed,”  “ attacking,”  “ captured,”  remind  us  of  our  own  chess- 
board terms.  In  addition,  we  meet  in  the  Yih  passim  with  generals, 
the  tsz’,  i.  e.,  sages  or  advisers,  horses,  carriages,  and  elephants.1 

Legge  translates  the  aphorism  of  the  second  Luh  line  of  the 
second  Kwa  thus  : 

“(The  second  line  divided)  [shows  the  attribute  of]  being  straight,  square, 
and  great.  (Its  operation)  without  repeated  efforts  will  be  in  every  respect  advan- 
tageous.” 

Dr.  Riedel  proposes  a more  literal  translation  : 

“Rectify,  [or]  square  greatly  (viz.  ever  so  much),  not  continuously  employing 
naught,  no  gain." 

The  Yang  and  Yin  lines  are  designated  by  kiu  and  luh 
two  characters  which  ordinarily  mean  nine  and  six.  Dr.  Riedel 
claims  with  great  plausibility,  that  they  are  employed  to  designate 
diameter  and  radius.  Kiu  means  not  only  “nine,”  but  also  “to 
go  to  the  end  of;  to  go  through;  or,  to  bring  together.”  It  is  a 
homonym  with  , its  inversion,2  which  means  “ to  take  hold  of ; to 
join  ; to  connect.”  Further,  luh  means  “six,”  and  in  analogy  with 
‘ ’ rh , which  means  “two”  and  “to  divide  into  two,”  luh  means 
also  “to  divide  into  sixes  ” and  then  sextant,  the  sixth  part  of  a circle 
or  the  radius  which  is  equal  to  the  chord  of  a sextant.  This  makes  it 
probable  that  kiu  in  the  Yih  King  means  diameter-line  ; and  luh 
radius  line,  which  again  are  identified  with  the  full  line  of  Yang  and 
the  broken  line  of  Yin. 


1 On  the  chess  of  the  Chinese  see  Williams’s  Middle  Kingdom , I.,  p.  827. 

2 chni,  mentioned  by  Williams  in  his  Syllabic  Dictionary,  p.  413. 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


47 


A passage  quoted  from  K‘ung  Ngan  Tsz’  Quoh  reads  : 

"The  spirit  tortoise  carried  a writing  and  methodically  arranged  divisions. 
In  both  respects  it  had  the  digits  up  to  nine." 

Comparing  this  with  a passage  in  the  Book  of  Three  Characters1 
which  declares  that  the  five  elements  “have  their  origin  in  num- 
bers,” Dr.  Riedel  deduces  from  observations  made  on  the  carapace 
of  a half-grown  Chrysemys  picta,2which  on  account  of  its  abnormal 
number  of  inner  and  outer  plates  a Chinaman  would  class  as  a shan 
kwei,  or  spirit  tortoise,  the  following  writing  of  the  nine  digits  as  a 
hypothetical  reconstruction  of  the  Loh  Shu  in  its  substance  : 


123  456789 


The  sum  of  the  Kiu  lines  is  16,  of  the  Lull  lines  29. 

The  plates  on  the  back  of  the  tortoise  yield  the  same  numbers 
in  the  same  proportion.  There  are  sixteen  large  inner  plates,  while 
there  are  twenty-three  small  outer  plates,  and  in  addition  we  have 
three  pairs  of  small  ones  that  appear  to  be  superimposed  upon  the 
three  vertebral  plates  in  the  centre.  The  symbols  of  the  five  ele- 
ments, as  written  on  p.  21,  yield  sixteen  long  and  twenty-nine  short 
lines. 

Now,  by  means  of  the  same  distribution  of  whole  and  broken 
lines  amongst  the  nine  digits,  Dr.  Riedel  claims  to  have  constructed 
“an  anagram  of  the  number  n in  one  hundred  and  twenty- three 
decimal  places,  exhibiting  the  sixty-four  Yih  kwa  in  their  specific 
order,  placed  in  rows  of  eight  each,  from  below  upwards.”  The  use 
of  an  anagram  for  the  purpose  of  laying  down  a scientific  truth  at 
the  time  inaccessible,  is  by  no  means  a device  unheard  of  in  the  his- 
tory of  science;  for  in  comparatively  recent  times  such  men  as 
Roger  Bacon,  Galileo,  and  Huygens  have  done  the  same  thing. 

The  spiritual  tortoise  accordingly  is  a lusus  naturae  which  ap- 


Open  Court,  No.  412 
2 See  Fig.  10  on  p 


An  English  translation  of  this  booklet  is  published  in  The 
The  passage  quoted  above  is  characters  199-204. 

20. 


48 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


pealed  to  the  mathematical  mind  of  the  Chinese  and  caused  them  to 
see  in  it  a spiritual  being. 

If  Dr.  Riedel’s  theory  is  not  the  restoration  of  the  ancient  Chi- 
nese conception,  we  may  rest  assured  that  it  was  some  quite  analo- 
gous scheme. 

Dr.  Riedel,  in  further  attempts  at  proving  the  presence  of  the 
number  tc  in  the  order  of  the  Kwa  of  the  Yih  King,  quotes  from 
Hi  isz ’ (App.  iii,  j,  § 70)  the  sentence  : “ The  Yih  contains  the  great 
extreme,”  and  says,  “Now  as  the  great  extreme  which  is  symbolised 
by  a circle  is  not  mentioned  at  all,  and  as  we  have  in  the  Yih  King 
proper  only  the  mutations  of  Yang  and  Yin,  the  Lull  and  Kiu,  the  two 
primary  forms  (Liang  I),  I conclude  that  they,  if  anything,  must  con- 
tain the  number  by  which  to  calculate  the  circle”  (i.  e.,  the  symbol 
of  the  great  extreme).  In  addition  to  this  argument,  Dr.  Riedel 
quotes  the  passage  Yih  Nik  Shu  Ye,  i.  e.,  “the  mutations  (are)  a 
refractory  number,”  “refractory  number”  being  defined  in  Shwoh 
Kwa  (App.  V.  2)  by  “making  acquainted  with  the  future,”  which 
is  the  opposite  to  a number  that  has  reference  to  the  past,  and  is 
consummated  or  “compliant.”  “Accordingly,”  says  Dr.  Riedel, 
“a  refractory  number  can,  in  the  adduced  passage,  mean  only  what 
we  call  an  irrational  number.” 

In  the  beginning  of  the  same  Appendix  we  read  : “ The  holy 
men  of  yore  who  composed  the  Yih,  concealed  their  help  in  spiritual 
light  and  thus  gave  life  to  the  milfoil  stalks.  They  triangulated1 
the  heaven,  made  twofold  the  earth,  and  relied  upon  calculation.” 
All  commentators  and  interpreters  agree  that  in  this  sentence  heaven 
means  the  circle,  and  earth  the  square.  Dr.  Riedel  suggests  that 
“making  twofold  the  earth  (viz.,  the  square)  indicates  the  primitive 
method  of  approximating  n by  circumscribed  and  inscribed  squares.  ” 

The  aphorism  of  the  fourth  hexagram  declares  : 

"Novice,  proceed.  We  do  not  seek  the  youthful  and  inexperienced.  The 
youthful  and  inexperienced  shall  seek  us.  In  its  first  (elements)  divination  is  pro- 
pounded. Further  details  (literally,  the  second  and  third)  would  be  tedious.  Te- 
dious rules  are  not  propounded." 

JThe  ancient  character  for  the  verb  " to  triangulate"  contains  three  triangles 
Compare  the  English  word  "trigonometry." 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


49 


As  to  the  original  meaning  of  “divination  ” in  the  minds  of  the 
Chinese,  Dr.  Riedel  adduces  from  an  English-Chinese  dictionary  the 
explanatory  character  swan,  which  denotes  “the  Chinese  abacus,” 
“to  cipher,”  “a  calculation,”  which  goes  far  to  prove  that  the  fun- 
damental meaning  of  “divination”  is  closely  connected  with  math- 
ematical, arithmetical,  and  logical  determination. 

In  addition  to  all  this  it  is,  at  least,  a strange  coincidence  that 
the  name  of  the  dynasty  Chen,  m after  which  the  present  book  of 
Yih  is  called,  means  “periphery,  curve,  enclosure.”  The  verb  cheu 
is  translated  by  Williams,  “to  make  a circuit;  to  environ.” 

It  cannot  be  my  purpose  to  enter  further  into  Dr.  Riedel’s  argu- 
ments, not  only  because  an  elaborate  proof  must,  in  the  very  nature 
of  things,  be  very  complicated,  but  also  because  I am  not  sufficiently 
acquainted  with  all  the  details  of  his  further  evidence.  Dr.  Riedel’s 
proposition  is,  to  say  the  least,  not  less  probable  than  any  one  of 
the  other  theories  of  the  Yih  King  that  have  been  advanced.  I have 
devoted  more  space  to  it  because  it  is  as  yet  unknown,  and,  being 
very  striking  and  ingenious,  it  is  worthy  of  a careful  consideration. 
Many  of  his  observations  which  I have  inquired  into  as  carefully  as 
I could,  with  my  still  limited  knowledge  of  the  Chinese  language, 
appear  to  me  correct : but  I have  not  as  yet  been  persuaded  to  adopt 
his  main  theories,  that  the  Yih  is  a calendar  and  that  a portion  of  it 
is  devoted  to  the  problem  of  squaring  the  circle. 


TIEN 


ft 


AND  SHANG  TI 

PERSONAL  GOD. 


if 


THE  BELIEF  IN  A 


At  first  sight  there  does  not  seem  to  be  much  room  in  the  Yang 
and  Yin  philosophy  for  a personal  God.  Nevertheless,  the  Chinese 
believe  in  i f the  Lord  on  High,  who  is  the  sole  ruler  of  the 
universe  and  the  sole  God  above  all  the  mythological  deities. 

* The  divine  power  to  which  men  look  up  as  to  their  authority  of 
conduct  is  commonly  designated  with  the  impersonal  term 
Then,1  i.  e. , Heaven,  which  may  be  translated  by  Godhood  or  Deity. 


ft 


T'iert  consists  of 


great  ” and 


“ one.” 


50 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


If  conceived  as  a personal  being  T'ien  is  called  Shang  Ti,  i.  e.  the 
High  Sovereign,  or  the  Lord  on  High. 

The  worship  of  Shang  Ti  must  be  very  old,  for  we  read  that 
after  a severe  drought  Ching  Tang,  the  founder  of  the  Shang  dy- 
nasty, which  began  1766  B.  C.,  publicly  paid  religious  -worship  to 
Shang  Ti,  confessing  his  offences,  which  were  six.  He  had  scarcely 
finished  his  confession  when  the  rain  fell  in  torrents.  We  must  add 
that  on  this  occasion  the  worship  of  Shang  Ti  is  not  related  as  an 
innovation,  but  as  a means  of  deliverance  that  naturally  suggested 
itself  to  a good  ruler.1 

In  the  very  oldest  documents  of  the  Shu  King  the  term 
“ Heaven  ” is  used  as  is  our  deity,  implying  even  the  conception  of 
a personal  being.  Thus  we  read  in  the  Counsels  of  Kao-Yao  : 

' ‘ The  work  [i.  e.,  the  bringing  to  an  end]  is  Heaven's  ; but  men  must  act  for  it.2 

“ From  Heaven  are  the  relationships  with  their  several  duties.  From  Heaven 
are  the  [social]  distinctions  with  their  several  ceremonies. 

“ Heaven  punishes  the  guilty. 

“ Heaven  hears  and  sees  as  our  people  hear  and  see.  Heaven  brightly  approves 
and  displays  its  terrors  as  our  people  brightly  approve  and  overawe.  Such  connex- 
ion is  between  the  upper  and  lower  (worlds)." — Sacred  Books  of  the  East,  III.,  pp. 
55-56. 

Quotations  like  these  can  be  multiplied  by  the  thousands.  We 
have  purposely  limited  them  to  the  most  ancient  documents  in  the 
Shu  King  in  order  to  prove  that  the  idea  of  a supreme  personal 
deity  is  not  of  modern  date.  At  present  the  worship  of  Shang  Ti 
is  regarded  as  so  holy  that  the  emperor,  as  the  High  Priest  of  the 
nation,  is  alone  permitted  to  perform  the  ceremony. 

Peking,  the  capital  of  China  consists  of  three  cities  : the  Tartar 
city  to  the  North,  the  Forbidden  city  with  the  imperial  palaces  and 
parks  lying  within  the  Tartar  city,  and  the  Chinese  city  to  the  South. 
In  the  southern  part  of  the  Chinese  city  is  a park  of  about  a square 
mile  containing  the  Temple  of  Heaven  and  the  Altar3  of  Heaven, 


1 See  Williams’s  The  Middle  Kingdom,  II. , p.  154. 

2 Or  better  : “ Consummation  is  Heaven's,  but  men  must  work  for  it." 

3 We  retain  this  traditional  translation  “altar,”  although  it  is  misleading  since 
it  suggests  the  erroneous  idea  that  it  must  be  an  altar  such  as  we  see  in  Catholic 
churches  or  as  it  was  used  by  the  ancient  Greeks. 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


51 


which  are  to  the  Chinese  the  most  sacred  spots  on  earth.  The 
Temple  of  Heaven  (or  more  correctly,  “ the  Altar  of  praying  for 
grain”)  is  a triple  marble  terrace,  twenty-seven  feet  in  height,  sur- 
rounded with  marble  balustrades  and  crowned  with  a temple  which 
rises  to  the  height  of  ninety-nine  feet.  The  three  terraces  and  the 
temple  are  circular.  The  symmetry  of  the  proportions  renders  it 
most  beautiful ; its  dome  imitates  in  shape  and  color  the  vault  of 
heaven,  and  as  the  round  windows  are  shaded  by  blinds  of  blue 
glass-rods  strung  together,  the  entering  sun  casts  an  azure  light 
upon  the  rich  carvings  and  paintings  in  the  inside.  The  same  park 
in  which  the  Temple  of  Heaven  stands,  contains  the  Altar  of 
Heaven,  which  is  enclosed  by  an  outer  square  wall  and  an  inner  cir- 
cular wall ; and  it  is  here  that  the  emperors  of  China  at  the  time  of 
our  Christmas  have  been  in  the  habit,  from  time  immemorial,  of  wor- 
shipping Shang  Ti,  “the  Lord  on  High,”  or  as  the  Emperor 

Kanghi  expressed  himself  : “ the  true  God.”  The  Altar  of  Heaven 
(a  picture  of  which  forms  the  frontispiece  to  the  first  volume  of  Wil- 
liams’s Middle  Kingdom ) is  described  by  Williams  as  follows1: 

“ It  is  a beautiful  triple  circular  terrace  of  white  marble,  whose  base  is  210,  mid- 
dle stage  150,  and  top  go  feet  in  width,  each  terrace  encompassed  by  a richly  carved 
balustrade.  A curious  symbolism  of  the  number  three  and  its  multiples  may  be 
noticed  in  the  measurements  of  this  pile.  The  uppermost  terrace,  whose  height 
above  the  ground  is  about  eighteen  feet,  is  paved  with  marble  slabs,  forming  nine 
concentric  circles — the  inner  of  nine  stones  inclosing  a central  piece,  and  around 
this  each  receding  layer  consisting  of  a successive  multiple  of  nine  until  the  square 
of  nine  (a  favorite  number  of  Chinese  philosophy)  is  reached  in  the  outermost  row. 
It  is  upon  the  single  round  stone  in  the  centre  of  the  upper  plateau  that  the  Em- 
peror kneels  when  worshipping  Heaven  and  his  ancestors  at  the  winter  solstice.” 

This  round  stone,  we  must  remember,  is  the  symbol  of  the 
T‘ai  Kih,  0>  the  ultimate  ground  of  being.  Williams  continues  : 

' ‘ Four  flights  of  nine  steps  each  lead  from  this  elevation  to  the  next  lower  stage, 
where  are  placed  tablets  to  the  spirits  of  the  sun,  the  moon,  the  stars,  and  the  Year 
God.  On  the  ground  at  the  end  of  the  four  stairways  stand  vessels  of  bronze  in 
which  are  placed  the  bundles  of  cloth  and  sundry  animals  constituting  a part  of  the 
sacrificial  offerings.  But  of  vastly  greater  importance  than  these  in  the  matter  of 

1 See  Williams's  Middle  Kingdom,  I.,  76-77,  and  The  Dragon,  Image,  and  De- 
nton, by  Du  Bose,  New  York,  1887  (pp.  57-64). 


52 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


burnt-offering  is  the  great  furnace,  nine  feet  high,  faced  with  green  porcelain,  and 
ascended  on  three  of  its  sides  by  porcelain  staircases.  In  this  receptacle,  erected 
some  hundred  feet  to  the  southeast  of  the  altar,  is  consumed  a burnt-offering  of  a 
bullock — entire  and  without  blemish — at  the  yearly  ceremony.  The  slaughter- 
house of  the  sacrificial  bullock  stands  east  of  the  North  Altar,  at  the  end  of  an  elab- 
orate winding  passage,  or  cloister  of  seventy-two  compartments,  each  ten  feet  in 
length.” 

Such  is  the  religious  and  popular  conception  of  Shang  Ti,  which 
is  as  deeply  rooted  in  the  Chinese  mind,  and  perhaps  more  deeply 
than  is  the  God-idea  in  the  West.  But  just  as  Western  philoso- 
phers translate  the  God-idea  of  religion  into  a philosophical  prin- 
ciple, (I  mention  Hegel’s  Absolute,  Schopenhauer’s  Will,  Fichte’s 
Moral  World-Order,  Spinoza’s  definition  of  Substance,  etc.,)  so 
the  educated  Chinese  speak  of  Lao-tsz’  ’s  Tao  or  World-Logos,  of 
Cheu  Tsz’  ’s  T‘ai  Kill  or  the  ultimate  ground  of  existence,  and  of  Chu 
Hi’s  Li  or  immaterial  principle.  Chu  Hi  touches  upon  the  problem 
of  the  personality  of  God  in  his  expositions  on  the  immaterial  prin- 
ciple and  primary  matter.  He  says  after  quoting  three  passages  from 
the  classics  in  which  the  terms  Shang  Ti  and  Then  (the  Lord  on 
High  and  Heaven)  imply  the  idea  of  a personal  God  : 

“All  these  and  such  like  expressions,  do  they  imply  that  above  the  azure  sky 
there  is  a Lord  and  Ruler  who  acts  thus,  or  is  it  still  true  that  heaven  has  no  mind, 
and  men  only  carry  out  their  reasonings  in  this  style  ? I reply,  these  three  things 
are  but  [expressions  of]  one  idea  ; it  is  that  the  immaterial  principle  of  [the  cosmic] 
order  is  such.  ’’ 

This  seems  to  imply  that  his  conception  of  the  k‘i  implies  per- 
sonality ; but  he  adds  : 

“ The  primary  matter,  in  its  evolutions  hitherto,  after  one  season  of  fulness  has 
experienced  one  of  decay,  and  after  a period  of  decline,  it  again  flourishes  ; just  as 
if  things  were  going  on  in  a circle.  There  never  was  a decay  without  a revival.” — 
Chinese  Repository , Vol.  XIII.,  p.  555. 

There  is  an  extensive  literature  on  the  question ; for  some  Chris- 
tian missionaries  have  objected  to  the  translation  of  Shang  Ti  by 
God  and  God  by  Shang  Ti,  proposing  other  words  in  its  place.1 

1 See  The  Chinese  Repository , Vol.  XVII.,  pp.  17-53,  57-89  (“Essay  on  the 
Term  for  Deity,”  by  William  J.  Boone,  Bishop  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church); 
ib.  pp.  105-133,  161-187,  209-242,  265-310,  321-354  (“ Chinese  Term  for  Deity," 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


53 


The  controversy  began  with  the  Roman  Catholic  missions. 
The  Jesuit  Ricci,  an  unusual  missionary  genius,  who  rendered  the 
Chinese  government  so  many  valuable  services  that  he  commanded 
the  Emperor’s  highest  respect  and  unbounded  confidence,  had  drawn 
up  rules  for  his  Christian  converts  in  which  he  permitted  certain 
Chinese  rites,  such  as  honoring  the  memory  of  Confucius  and  of  an- 
cestors, justifying  these  acts  by  an  explanation  of  their  purely  sec- 
ular significance.  Ricci  at  the  same  time  translated,  as  a matter  of 
course,  the  word  “God”  with  Shang  Ti,  and  his  methods  were 
silently  approved  in  Rome. 

Morales,  a Spanish  Dominican,  however,  jealous  of  the  great 
success  of  his  Jesuit  brethren,  denounced  Ricci  for  pandering  to 
idolatry.  The  propaganda  condemned  Ricci’s  methods  as  sinful, 
and  Pope  Innocence  confirmed  the  sentence  in  1645.  The  Jesuits 
remonstrated  and  succeeded.  Pope  Alexander  VI.  issued  another 
decree,  in  which,  without  directly  revoking  his  predecessor’s  deci- 
sion, he  sided  with  Ricci’s  policy,* 1  in  agreement  with  which,  in  1665, 
the  Jesuits  drew  up  forty-two  articles.  The  Dominicans  did  not  let 
things  rest  here;  Navarette,  one  of  their  order,  renewed  the  old  de- 
nunciations, and  Bishop  Maigrot,  an  apostolic  vicar  living  in  China, 
issued  a mandate  in  which  he  declared  that  “T‘ien”  signified  noth- 
ing more  than  “ the  material  heaven,”  and  that  the  Chinese  customs 
and  rites  were  idolatrous.  The  Jesuits  applied  to  the  Emperor  of 
China  for  an  authentic  explanation  of  the  significance  of  the  words 
for  God  and  of  the  Chinese  rites,  whereupon  Kanghi  the  Emperor 
declared  (in  1700)  that  Then  meant  the  true  God,  and  the  ceremonies 
of  China  were  political. 

But  the  efforts  of  the  Jesuits  to  influence  the  Pope  failed  ; Pope 
Clement  XI.  confirmed  the  mandate  of  Bishop  Maigrot  in  a bull 
(published  in  1703)  in  which  the  words  Then  and  Shang  Ti  were 


by  Dr.  W.  H.  Medhurst);  ib.  pp.  357-360  ("A  Few  Plain  Questions  by  a Brother 
Missionary”);  and  ib.  pp.  489  et  seq.,  545  et  seq.,  and  601  et  seq.  ("Dr.  Medhurst's 
Reply  to  Bishop  Boone”). 

1 Ricci’s  "Divine  Law  " is  published  in  an  unabridged  form  in  Kircher's  China 
Illustrala,  1667. 


54 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


rejected  as  pagan,  while  the  expression  T‘ien  Chu,  i.  e.  Lord  oi 
Heaven,  was  approved  of. 

From  these  days  the  rapid  decline  of  the  Roman  Catholic  mis- 
sions in  China  begins.  Ricci’s  doctrines  were  not  countenanced  in 
Rome,  and  Maigrot’s  followers  were  persecuted  by  the  Chinese  gov- 
ernment. 

Among  Protestant  missionaries  the  Rev.  Dr.  Boone  proposes 
to  translate  God  by  Shin  = Spirit,1  and  takes  the  field  against  all 
those  who  use  the  terms  Shang  Ti  or  Then;  but  he  is  opposed  by 
the  majority  of  his  colleagues,  Dr.  Medhurst,  Sir  George  Staunton, 
Dr.  Bowring,  Mr.  Dotty,  and  Professor  Legge. 

Prof.  James  Legge  has  written  a learned  discussion  on  the  sub- 
ject'2; adducing  innumerable  passages  in  corroboration  of  his  views. 
In  his  introduction  to  the  Shu  King  he  quotes  Tai  T‘ung’s  diction- 
ary in  defining  the  meaning  of  the  word  “ Ti.  ” Tai  T’ung  says  : 

“ Ti  is  the  honorable  designation  of  lordship  and  rule,  therefore  Heaven  is 
called  Shang  Ti ; the  Elementary  Powers  are  called  the  five  Ti ; and  the  Son  of 
Heaven — that  is,  the  Sovereign — is  called  Ti.  ” 

Professor  Legge  adds : 

“ Here  then  is  the  name  Heaven,  by  which  the  idea  of  Supreme  Power  in  the 
absolute  is  vaguely  expressed  ; and  when  the  Chinese  would  speak  of  it  by  a per- 
sonal name,  they  use  the  terms  Ti  and  Shang  Ti ; — -saying,  I believe,  what  our  early 
fathers  did,  when  they  began  to  use  the  word  God. 

“ Ti  is  the  name  which  has  been  employed  in  China  for  this  concept  for  fully 
five  thousand  years.  Our  word  God  fits  naturally  into  every  passage  where  the 
character  occurs  in  the  old  Chinese  Classics.  It  never  became  with  the  people  a 
proper  name  like  the  Zeus  of  the  Greeks.  I can  no  more  translate  Ti  or  Shang  Ti 
by  any  other  word  but  God  than  I can  translate  zan  by  anything  else  but  man.  ’ 

The  general  belief  that  the  Chinese  are  obstinately  opposed  to 
Christianity  and  Christian  ethics  is  a great  error.  The  Chinese  have 
a contempt  only  for  the  dogmatism  that  is  commonly  preached  to 
them  as  Christianity.  In  spite  of  all  the  missionary  efforts  of  Chris- 
tians, the  Chinese  know  of  Christianity  as  little  as,  or  even  less  than, 
Western  nations  know  of  Confucius,  Lao-tsz’,  and  Buddha.  How 


2 The  Notions  of  the  Chinese  Concerning  God  and  Spirits,  Hong  Kong,  1852. 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY 


55 


deeply  the  simple  story  of  Jesus  and  his  preachings  of  love  and 
charity  can  impress  the  Chinese  mind,  if  it  is  told  in  a truly  Chinese 
way,  without  identifying  Christianity  with  beef-eating  or  the  opium 
trade,  can  be  learned  from  the  fact  that  the  Tai  Ping  revolution, 
which  shook  the  throne  of  the  Celestial  Empire,  was  conducted  by 
native  Christians  who  could  no  longer  stand  the  persecutions  of  the 
Confucian  authorities.  Hung  Sew  Tseuen,  a simple  schoolmaster, 
who  in  his  youth  had  seen  visions  entrusting  him  with  a religious 
mission,  read  the  Gospel,  and,  being  impressed  with  its  moral  truths, 
baptised  himself  and  began  to  preach  Christ’s  ethics  of  good-will 
toward  all.  He  was  discharged  and  persecuted  because  he  refused 
to  pay  the  customary  worship  to  Confucius  ; but  he  continued  to 
preach  until  he  saw  himself  at  the  head  of  an  army  that  might  have 
overpowered  the  government  of  the  Chinese  Empire.  While  this 
rebellion  raged  in  China,  the  English  did  not  even  know  that  the 
rebels  were  Christians.  So  little  did  they  know  of  the  affairs  of  the 
interior  of  China  ! 

Hung  Sew  Tseuen  is  described  in  The  Chinese  and  General  Mis- 
sionary Gleaner  as  “of  ordinary  appearance,  about  five  feet  four 
or  five  inches  high,  well  built,  round  faced,  regular  featured,  rather 
handsome,  about  middle  age,  and  gentlemanly  in  his  manners.” 

Thomas  Taylor  Meadows,  Chinese  interpreter  in  H.  M.  Civil 
Service,  has  published  a detailed  account  of  the  Tai  Ping  revolu- 
tion1 in  his  book,  The  Chinese  and  Their  Rebellions,  London,  1856. 
He  says  on  page  193  : 

“ My  knowledge  of  the  Chinese  mind,  joined  to  the  dejected  admissions  that 
Protestant  missionaries  of  many  years’  standing  occasionally  made  of  the  fruitless- 
ness of  their  labors,  had  convinced  me  that  Christianity,  as  hardened  into  our  sec- 
tarian creeds,  could  not  possibly  find  converts  among  the  Chinese,  except  here  and 
there  perhaps  an  isolated  individual.  Consequently  when  it  was  once  or  twice  ru- 
mored that  the  large  body  of  men  who  were  setting  Imperial  armies  at  defiance 
'were  Christians,’  I refused  to  give  the  rumor  credence.  It  did  not  occur  to  me 
that  the  Chinese  convert,  through  some  tracts  of  a Chinese  convert,  might  either 
fail  to  see,  or  (if  he  saw  them),  might  spontaneously  eliminate  the  dogmas  and  con- 
gealed forms  of  merely  sectarian  Christianity,  and  then  by  preaching  simply  the 
great  religious  truth  of  One  God,  and  the  pure  morality  of  Christ's  Sermon  on  the 


1 See  also  Rev.  Th.  Hamberg’s  article  in  the  N.  Am.  Review,  Vol.  LXXIX.,  p.  158. 


56 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


Mount,  obtain  numbers  of  followers  among  people  disgusted  with  the  idolatry  and 
the  immorality  that  they  and  those  around  them  were  engulfed  in.  As  we  have 
seen  above,  this  was  actually  the  case  with  Hung  Sew  Tseuen.” 


LAO-TSZ’  ^3 


* 


AND  CONFUCIUS 


The  Yang  and  Yin  conception  of  the  ancient  Chinese  has  exer- 
cised a dominating  influence  upon  all  Chinese  thinkers1,  with  the 
sole  exception  of  Lao-tsz’,  who  lived  at  the  end  of  the  sixth  century 

before  Christ.  Lao-tsz”s  lit  Tao-  Teh-Kin*  (“  the  Clas- 

^ lAii  Toi 

sic  on  Reason  andVirtue,”  that  wonderful  booklet  on  Tao,  i.  e., 
the  Path  or  Method,  the  Word  or  Reason,  the  Logos,  that  was  in  the 
beginning  and  on  Teh  virtue,2  propounding  an  ethics  that  repu- 
diates all  self-assertion,  closely  resembling  the  injunctions  of  both 
Buddha  and  Christ),  stands  alone  in  the  whole  literature  of  China. 
It  is  not  less  monistic  than  the  doctrines  of  the  T’ai  Kih,  but  less 
rigid,  less  a priori,  less  self-sufficient.  It  would  have  served  the  Chi- 
nese better  than  the  Confucian  philosophy. 

Williams  defines  > ^ tao,  as  follows : 


' A road,  path,  or  way  ; . . . a principle,  a doctrine,  that  which  the  mind  ap- 
proves; used  in  the  classics  in  the  sense  of  the  right  path  in  which  one  ought  to  go 
either  in  ruling  or  observing  rules;  rectitude  or  right  reason  ; in  early  times,  up  to 
500  A.  D.,  the  Buddhists  called  themselves  tao-yan,  i.  e.,  men  (seeking  for)  reason 
[enlightenment],  or  intelligent  men,  denoting  thereby  their  aspiration  after  ‘ pu-ti 
(Sanskrit  bodhi),  intelligence  ; the  Reason  or  Logos  of  the  rationalists  ” [the  so-called 
Taoists].3  . . . [As  a verb  tao  means]  “ to  lead,  to  direct,  to  go  in  a designated  path  ; 
to  speak,  to  converse.” 


1 On  the  literature  of  China,  see  Schott’s  " Entwurf  einer  Beschreibung  der 
chinesischen  Litteratur,  gelesen  in  der  Akademie  der  Wissenschaften,”  1850,  and 
published  in  the  Philosophisch-IIistorische  Klasse  in  1853,  pp.  293-418. 

2 lilS;  is  a combination  of  the  three  radicals  "to  go,”  “ straight,”  and  "heart." 

3 The  Taoists  who  regard  themselves  as  followers  of  Lao-tsz’ have  distorted 
their  master’s  doctrines  beyond  recognition.  The  Tao  religion  is  best  characterised 
in  "The  Book  of  Rewards  and  Punishments,”  translated  in  full  only  into  French 
by  Stanislaus  Julien  under  the  title  Le  livre  des  recompenses  et  des  peines.  Paris, 
1835.  See  also  Confucianism  and  Taoism,  by  Prof.  Robert  K.  Douglas. 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


57 


The  character  tao,  is  composed  of  “to  go”  and  “head,” 
denoting  “marching  at  the  head.” 

We  are  told  that  Confucius  visited  Lao-Tsz’,  who,  being  by 
half  a century  his  senior,  must  then  have  been  about  eighty  years 
old.  While  Confucius  propounded  the  maxims  of  justice,  the  old 
philosopher  urged  the  principle  of  good-will  toward  every  one,  say- 
ing d 

“ Recompense  injury  with  kindness.” 

Confucius,  unable  to  fathom  Lao-tsz’  ’s  meaning,  replied  : 

“With  what  then  will  you  recompense  kindness?  Recompense  injury  with 
justice  (punishment),  and  recompense  kindness  with  kindness.  ” 

Lao-tsz’  propounds  the  gist  of  his  ethics  in  §49  of  the  Tao- 
Teh-King,  where  he  says  : 

' ‘ The  good  I would  meet  with  goodness.  The  not-good  I would  also  meet  with 
goodness  ; for  the  teh  2 (virtue)  is  good  (throughout).  The  faithful  I would  meet  with 
faith.  The  not-faithful  I would  also  meet  with  faith  ; (for)  the  teh  (virtue)  is  good 
(throughout).” 

Lao-tsz’  objected  to  the  very  basis  of  Confucian  morality. 
Confucius  expected  to  make  people  good  by  teaching  them  pro- 
priety; if  they  were  but  respectful  to  parents  and  superiors,  if  they 
brought  sacrifices  to  the  shrines  of  their  ancestors,  and  observed  the 
appropriate  rules  and  ceremonies,  mankind  would  become  moral. 
Lao-tsz’  exhibited  an  undisguised  contempt  for  externalities  and 
ancestor-worship.  He  demanded  purity  of  heart,  emptiness  of  de- 
sire, and  a surrender  of  all  self-display,  in  imitation  of  the  great  Tao 
(Reason),  which -serves  all  without  seeking  its  own.1 2 3 

Sz’  Ma  Tsfien,4  who  lived  about  163-85  B.  C.,  reports  on  the 
authority  of  Chwang-tsz’  (about  330  B.  C.)  that  Confucius  in  his 
interview  with  Lao-tsz’,  showed  himself  overawed  by  reverence  for 
the  wisdom  of  the  ancient  traditions.  Lao-tsz’  said  : 


1John  Chalmer’s  The  Speculations  of  the  Old  Philosopher,  Lau-tsz’ , p.  xviii. 

2 

3 See  also  Douglas’s  Confucianism  and  Taoisjn,  pp.  176  et  seq. 

4 The  original  Chinese  text  with  a German  translation  is  published  by  Gabe- 
lentz  in  his  Anfangsgriinde  der  Chinesischen  Granunatik,  p.  met  seq. 


58 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


"Lord,  of  whom  you  speak,  the  men  and  their  bones,  I suppose,  have  alto- 
gether rotted  away.  Their  words  only  are  still  extant.  Moreover,  if  a sage  find 
his  time,  he  rises ; if  he  does  not  find  his  time,  he  wanders  about  like  a P'ung  plant 
[which  is  described  by  the  commentators  to  be  a plant,  growing  on  the  sand  and 
easily  carried  about  by  the  wind],  I have  heard,  a wise  merchant  hides  [his  treas- 
ures] deeply,  as  if  [his  house  or  safe]  were  empty.  A sage  of  perfect  virtue  gives 
himself  the  appearance  as  though  [he  were]  simple-minded  Jjl  yil.1 

" Give  up  your  proud  spirit,  your  many  wishes,  your  external  appearance  with 
your  exaggerated  plans.  These  all  are  of  no  advantage  to  the  sage’s  person.  This 
is  what  I have  to  communicate  to  you,  sir  ; that  is  all.” 

Sz’-Ma-Ts‘ien  continues: 

"Confucius  went ; and  he  said  to  his  disciples  : 1 Of  the  birds  I know  that  they 
can  fly,  of  the  fishes  I know  that  they  can  swim,  of  the  beasts  I know  that  they  can 
run.  For  the  running,  one  makes  nooses  ; for  the  swimming,  one  makes  nets  ; for 
the  flying,  one  makes  arrows.  As  to  the  dragon,  I do  not  know  how  he  rides  upon 
wind  and  clouds  up  to  heaven.  To-day  I saw  Lao-tsz’.  Is  he  perhaps  like  the 
dragon  ? ’ " 

Confucius  was  more  congenial  to  his  countrymen  than  Lao-tsz’, 
for  he  was  more  typically  Chinese.  Although  his  life  had  been  an 
unbroken  chain  of  disappointments,  Confucius  succeeded  after  his 
death  in  becoming  the  moral  teacher  of  the  Chinese  people.  His 
agnostic  attitude  in  metaphysics  and  religion  which  neither  affirms 
nor  denies  the  existence  of  a beyond,  of  God,  or  gods,  and  of  ghosts, 
but  avoids  investigating  the  matter,  his  unbounded  reverence  for 
the  past,  his  respect  for  scholarship  and  book-learning,  his  ethics  of 
traditionalism,  which  implies  an  extreme  conservatism,  his  exag- 
geration of  propriety,  his  ceremonialism,  and  above  all  his  ideal  of 
submission  to  authority  have  more  and  more  become  national  traits 
of  the  Chinese  nation. 

What  a pity  that  the  weakness  of  China  is  an  exaggerated  vir- 
tue ; it  is  reverence  run  mad — a virtue  in  which  America  is  as  much 
deficient  as  China  is  in  excess. 

It  was  characteristic  of  a typical  Chinaman  like  Confucius  that 


1 Gabelentz  translates  by  " durnm.” 

bols  denoting  "monkey”  and  "heart  or  mind." 
ary  of  the  Chinese  Language,  p.  1120. 


The  character  contains  the  sym- 
See  Williams's  Syllabic  Diction- 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


59 


he  should  have  admired  the  Yih  King  solely  on  account  of  its  age, 
because  it  came  down  to  him  from  the  sages  of  yore.  He  said : 

"Should  a few  more  years  be  granted  to  me,  I shall  have  applied  fifty  to  study- 
ing the  Yih  and  thereby  could  be  free  from  erring  greatly.” — Liin  Yii,  VII.,  16.1 

We  know  much  more  about  Confucius  than  about  any  other 
Chinese  philosopher,  emperor,  or  saint,  but  it  appears  that  he  was 
more  of  a moral  teacher  than  a philosopher  or  mathematician,  and 
it  is  probable  that  the  Yih  King  was  to  him  a book  with  seven  seals, 
the  unintelligibility  of  which  fascinated  him. 

Having  impressed  upon  the  nation  his  personality,  Confucius 
lived  on  in  the  souls  of  his  countrymen  ; and,  following  their  mas- 
ter’s injunction,  the  Chinese  continued  to  study  the  Yih  King 
without  finding  the  solution  of  its  problems.  Instead  of  avoiding 
grave  mistakes,  they  committed  the  gravest  one  : they  relied  upon 
traditional  authority  and  ceased  to  be  self-dependent.  Instead  of 
deciphering  the  eternal  revelation  of  truth  that  surrounds  us  in  the 
living  book  of  nature  and  of  our  individual  experiences,  they  pon- 
dered over  the  secret  meanings  of  the  holy  Yih  King  ; and  even  to- 
day there  are  many  among  them  who  believe  that  the  Yih  King  con- 
tains all  the  wisdom,  physical,  moral,  and  metaphysical,  that  can  be 
conceived  by  any  of  the  sages  of  the  world.2 

The  mistake  of  the  Chinese  is  natural  and  perhaps  excusable, 
for  it  is  founded  upon  a profound,  although  misunderstood  and  mis- 
applied, reverence  for  the  great  sages  who  laid  the  cornerstone  of 
their  civilisation.  We,  as  outsiders,  can  easily  appreciate  the  merits 
and  reject  the  errors  of  the  fundamental  principles  of  Chinese 
thought ; but  not  all  of  us  are  conscious  of  the  fact  that  in  many  re- 
spects we  too  suffer  from  an  exaggerated  reverence  for  traditionalism. 


1Such  is  the  translation  according  to  Dr.  Riedel,  which,  after  a comparison 
with  the  original,  I find,  so  far  as  I can  judge,  as  literal  as  possible.  Professor  Legge 
translates : "If  some  years  were  added  to  my  life,  I would  give  fifty  to,"  etc. 

2 The  claim  that  the  Yih  contains  all  science  should  be  interpreted  in  the  same 
sense  as  we  might  declare  that  logic  contains  all  possible  rules  of  thought,  and  the 
multiplication-table  is  the  essence  of  all  possible  numerical  relations. 


6o 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


CONCLUSION. 

Whatever  may  be  the  solution  of  the  mystery  of  the  Yih  King,  it 
is  almost  certain  that  the  Chinese  themselves  do  not  understand  it. 
Thus  in  spite  of  the  simplicity  of  their  philosophy  of  permutations,  as 
we  may  briefly  call  the  theory  of  constructing  a world-conception 
from  Yang  and  Yin  elements,  all  their  thinking,  planning,  and  yearn- 
ing is  dimmed  by  mysticism  ; and  the  vain  hope  of  divination  fills 
their  minds  with  superstitious  beliefs  which  makes  them,  on  the  one 
hand,  slavishly  submissive  to  the  various  evils  of  life,  and,  on  the 
other  hand,  self-satisfied  in  the  belief  that  their  sages  alone  are  in 
possession  of  the  philosophers’  stone.  All  this  renders  the  Chinese 
unfit  to  grasp  the  significance  of  reality,  and  abandons  them  almost 
hopelessly  to  the  mercy  of  their  own  barbarous  institutions,  such  as 
their  antiquated  penal  laws  and  prison  practices,  extortionate  taxa- 
tion, and  the  arbitrary  government  system,  to  which  they  patiently 
submit. 

Patience  is  a virtue  which  is  much  admired  in  China  and  highly 
praised  in  prose  and  verse,  as  the  basis  of  self-control,  domestic 
peace,  and  good  government.  We  read  in  the  famous  Pih  Jin  Ko, 
the  “Ode  on  Universal  Patience”:1 

“ This  song  of  patience  universal, 

Of  universal  patience  sings. 

Can  one  be  patient,  summer  is  not  hot ; 

Can  one  be  patient,  winter  is  not  cold. 

Can  one  be  patient,  poverty  is  yet  happy; 

Can  one  be  patient,  long  life  may  yet  be  protracted. 

With  impatience,  little  evils  change  to  great ; 

With  impatience,  a good  nature  at  length  becomes  wolfish. 

Kow  Tseen  tasted  gall,  and  patiently  waited  for  revenge  ; 

Tan  of  Yen,  from  want  of  moderation,  in  the  end  was  lost  and  perished. 

Sze  Tih,  when  spit  upon  in  the  face,  patiently  let  it  dry; 

Tih  Chaou,  for  want  of  patience,  was  a very  dunce. 

1 See  Chinese  Repository , Vol.  IX.,  p.  48,  where  the  original  Chinese  is  published 
together  with  an  English  translation. 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


6l 


The  benevolent  endure  what  other  men  can  hardly  bear ; 

The  wise  submit  to  what  others  never  would  endure. 

To  repress  anger  and  restrain  the  passions  is  the  square  of  patience  ; 

To  wear  the  petticoat,1  and  be  humble,  is  the  rule  of  patience. 

Patience  is  the  watchword  for  laying  the  foundation  of  perfection  ; 

Patience  is  the  watchword  for  forming  the  root  of  virtue. 

Patience  is  the  watchword  to  succeed  among  barbarians  and  savages  ; 

Patience  is  the  watchword  to  rule  the  violent  and  obstinate. 

Can  one  bear  toil  and  labor,  one  will  have  a superabundance  : 

Can  one  refrain  from  wild  excess,  one  will  be  free  from  violent  disease. 

Can  one  forbear  tattle,  one  will  avoid  slander  ; 

Can  one  forbear  strife  and  contention,  one  dissipates  hatred  and  resentment 

Can  one  submit  to  abuse  and  raillery,  one  shows  his  caliber  ; 

Can  one  bend  to  thorough  study,  one  accumulates  learning. 

Once  patient,  all  blessings  come  in  company; 

Once  patient,  every  woe  is  burnt  to  ashes.” 

The  Chinese  government,  and  with  it  the  Chinese  nation,  seem 
to  be  at  present  in  a pitiable  plight ; and,  indeed,  their  empire  is 
like  a Colossus  of  brass  on  clay  feet. 

Nevertheless,  there  is  at  the  foundation  of  the  Chinese  civili- 
sation and  of  the  Chinese  national  character  a nucleus  of  moral 
worth  and  intellectual  capabilities  which  may  come  to  the  front 
again.  To  conquer  China  in  war  may  be  easy  enough,  but  to  com- 
pete with  her  children  in  the  industrial  persuits  of  peace  may  prove 
impossible.  The  conqueror  often  succumbs  to  the  less  noisy  but 
more  powerful  virtues  of  the  conquered.  Thus  Greece  overcame 
Rome  and  the  Saxons  Anglicised  the  Normans.  When  the  walls 
break  down  which  separate  China  from  the  rest  of  the  world  so  as 
to  give  the  Chinese  a chance  of  learning  from  us  all  they  can,  it  is 
very  doubtful  what  the  result  of  a free  competition  with  the  Chinese 
will  be.  Their  imperturbable  patience,  their  endurance,  their  stead- 
fast character,  their  pious  reverence,  their  respect  for  learning, 


1This  phrase  means  "to  be  submissive  to  authority,  as  a wife  ought  to  be  to 
her  husband,”  being  the  reverse  of  a well-known  expression  in  English  slang. 


62 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


should  not  be  underrated.  If  these  virtues  are  but  turned  in  the 
right  direction  and  tempered  by  that  breadth  of  mind  which  is  in- 
dispensable for  progress,  the  Chinese  will  soon  recover;  and  nothing 
is  more  apt  to  produce  a national  rebirth  than  hard  times,  trials, 
and  humiliations. 

China  is  offered  in  her  recent  misfortunes  the  chance  of  a spir- 
itual rebirth.  Should  she  avail  herself  of  this  opportunity,  she 
would,  with  her  four  hundred  millions  of  inhabitants  and  her  untold 
virgin  resources,  at  once  take  a prominent  rank  among  the  nations 
of  the  earth ; and  her  civilisation  might  become  strong  enough  to 
influence  and  modify  our  own. 


INDEX. 


Altar  of  heaven,  50. 

Binary  system  of  Leibnitz  and  the  Kwa 
in  diagrams  compared,  41. 

Calendar  (t'ung  shu),  the  yih  supposed 
to  be  a,  45.  (Cf.  “t'ung  shu.”) 

Cantor,  Prof.  Moritz,  42. 

Cheu  Dynasty,  7,  49. 

Cheu  Sin,  the  dissolute  tyrant,  8. 

Cheu  Tsz’s  philosophy,  27,  28,  29,  30; 
his  diagram  of  the  great  extreme,  28. 

Chih,  gross  matter,  31. 

Ch'ing,  truthfulness,  30. 

Christian  missionaries  on  the  term 
Shang-Ti,  52-54. 

Christianity,  the  Chinese  not  opposed 
to,  54. 

Chu-Hi,  6 ; his  philosophy,  30-35. 

Confucius,  37,  56-58. 

Conservative,  the  Chinese,  on  account 
of  their  script,  1. 

Corea,  the  flag  of,  36. 

Divination,  7;  by  stalks,  13  ; by  the 
spirit  tortoise,  13-16. 

Douglas,  Prof,  R.  K.,  36,  56. 

Elements,  the  five,  20,  21,  22  ; appear 
in  Cheu  Tsz’s  diagram,  28. 

Extreme,  Kwa,  evolution  from  great, 
26  : the  great,  35. 

Filial  piety,  36,  37. 

Filials,  twenty-four,  38. 

Fuh-Hi,  4,  26. 


Goethe,  on  rest,  27. 

Great  plan  (Hung-fan),  16,  21,  22,  24. 

Harlez,  Ch.  de,  44. 

Hexagrams,  arranged  in  square  and  cir- 
cle, 10;  according  to  Wen-Wang,  11 ; 
significance  of,  12. 

Hiao,  filial  piety,  36. 

Ho,  Map  of,  3,  5,  17;  original  table  re- 
produced, 19  ; dragon-horse  carrying 
the,  20. 

Hung-Sew-Tseuen,  the  originator  of  the 
Tai-Ping  rebellion,  55. 

Ideal,  of  royal  perfection,  according  to 
the  great  plan,  23  ; of  Chinese  moral- 
ity, submission  to  traditions,  2. 

K’i,  vitality  and  primary  substance, 
30-33- 

Kih,  the  extreme,  31;  t'ai  kih  (the  great 
extreme),  24-26,  29,  34,  41,  51. 

Kwa,  4,  6 ; evolution  from  great  ex- 
treme, 26,  39-42. 

Lacouperie,  A.  Terrien  de,  43. 

Lao-Tze,  56-57. 

Legge,  Prof.  James,  26,  42,  46,  54. 

Leibnitz,  39-42. 

Li,  the  immaterial  principle,  30-34. 

Map  of  Ho,  3,  5,  17;  original  table  re- 
produced, 19 ; dragon-horse  carrying 
the,  20. 

McClatchie,  Canon,  43. 

Meadows,  Thomas  Taylor,  on  the  Tai- 
Ping  Revolution,  55-56. 


6+ 


CHINESE  PHILOSOPHY. 


Milfoil,  13. 

Moral  worth  of  the  Chinese,  61. 

Morrison,  Dr.,  on  the  beauty  of  Chinese 
script,  2. 

Nirvdna,  27. 

Patience,  a Chinese  ode  on,  60. 

Philastre,  P.  L F. , 43. 

Regis,  P.,  the  Jesuit,  42. 

Reverence  of  the  Chinese  for  the  great 
sages,  59. 

Riedel,  Dr.  Heinrich,  44-47. 

Riickert,  35. 

Shan  kwei,  the  spirit-tortoise,  13,  15  ; 
illustration,  20. 

Shang-Ti,  the  Lord  on  High,  8,  49-55  ; 
Christian  missionaries  on,  52-54. 

Shi,  milfoil,  13. 

Shi  tsao,  divining  stalks,  13. 

Shu-King,  quotation  from,  50. 

Siang,  the  four,  3-4. 

Symbol,  of  the  source  of  existence,  dia- 
gram, 34  ; of  the  T’ai  Kih,  51. 

Sz’-Ma-Ts’ien,  57-58. 


Tao,  Lao-Tze’s,  34  ; the,  56-57. 

Teh,  57. 

Tortoise,  13,  15  ; illustration  of,  20. 

T'ung  shu  (general  treatise)  Cheu-tsz’s 
book,  29-30 ; the  yih  as  a t'ung  shu, 
45.  (Cf.  ‘'Calendar.") 

Trigrams,  tables  of  Fuh-Hi  and  Wen- 
Wang,  9. 

Tseu-Yen,  on  the  five  elements,  21. 

Ultimate  ground  of  existence  (T’ai  Kih, 
great  extreme),  24,  25,  26,  28,  29. 

Wen-Wang,  7. 

Williams,  39. 

Writing  of  the  river  Loh,  3,  17;  original 
table  reproduced,  19. 

Yang  and  Yin,  3 ; on  Cheu-Tsz’s  dia- 
gram, 28,  36. 

Yih,  6,  39,  42,  43,  44. 

Yih-King,  7,  17. 

Yu,  4-5. 

Zero,  27 

Zottoli,  P.  Angelo,  43. 


Since  the  first  publication  of  this  article,  which  appeared  in  The  Monist,  Vol. 
VI.,  No.  2,  in  January  1896,  the  author  has  in  many  instances  adopted  other  tran- 
scriptions of  Chinese  words  which  remain  unaltered  in  this  new  edition.  For  the 
assistance  of  the  uninitiated  reader  we  mention  especially  that  the  words  here 
spelled  Cheu  (viz.,  the  dynasty  and  Cheu  Tsze),  K'i  (vitality  or  breath  of  life),  Ki 
(the  extreme,  or  ultimate  ground  of  existence),  and  Sze-Ma  Ts'ien  have  been  tran- 
scribed Cho,  Ch'i,  Chi,  and  Sze-Ma-Ch'ien  in  the  author's  forthcoming  translation 
of  Lao-Tze’s  Tao-Teh-King.  Further,  the  author  would  now  prefer  the  spelling 
Cho-Tze  to  Cheu- Tsze.  The  words  Fuh-Hi  and  Yih  are  transcribed  by  Samuel 
Wells  Williams  Fu-I  and  /,  by  Sir  Thomas  Wade  Fu-I  and  Yi. 


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